Smear Tactics Used In Ukraine Constitution Row, Says Court Justice

KIEV, Ukraine -- Susana Stanik, a justice in Ukraine's top court, claimed on Friday political groups had targeted her with a smear campaign in a bid to influence her vote in an upcoming hearing on the country's ongoing constitutional crisis.

Justice Susana Stanik
"I am doing everything possible, so that this case is heard," she told reporters in Kiev. "There has been a dirty campaign to pressure me and my family members so that I do not prepare for the case properly. "

Stanik is one of 18 constitutional court justices scheduled on Wednesday to review the legality of President Viktor Yushchenko's controversial order last week declaring parliament dissolved.

Viktor Yanukovich, the parliament majority leader, has called the order illegal, and the legislature has continued to meet.

Stanik was responding to allegations made on Ukrainian internet websites accusing her of having received a new Kiev apartment from the government, in exchange for her support to Yushchenko in in the hearing.

Rocketing real estate prices in central Kiev rival Tokyo and London. A state-allocated apartment in the best regions of the city would be worth millions of dollars.

Yushchenko supports market reform and closer relations with Europe while Yanukovich supports closer relations with Russia, and government assistance to industrial tycoons.

Stanik said she intended to review the case impartially, but warned she and members of her family "could become targets of physical violence. "

Yushchenko on Wednesday assigned bodyguards from the country's elite national spy agency, the SBU, to any court justice in need of protection.

The promise of bodyguards came last week, after five justices threatened to walk off the case because of efforts by the country's political camps to influence their vote.

They did not make public the nature of the pressure tactics or name the side using them.

Most political observers believe the court is split almost evenly between Yushchenko and Yanukovich appointees, as parliament and the president appoint six justices each according to statute.

Stanik is considered an exception by most political analysts and a as a potential swing vote, as she was not appointed by polticians, but rather a supposedly apolitical judicial council.

The upcoming court decision is likely to set constitutional precedent, and determine whether the president or the prime minister runs the executive branch of government.

Both Yushchenko and Yanukovich have said they will abide by the high court ruling.

The Ukrainian capital Kiev has seen street demonstrations, and vicious polemics across the media for nearly two weeks, as both sides have jockeyed for public support in the run-up to the court hearing.

Source: Jurnalo