Kids Raped in Famous Ukrainian Recreation Camp, Russia Today, October 13, 2009

Kids Raped in Famous Ukrainian Recreation Camp?

Russia Today
October 13, 2009

http://www.russiatoday.com/Top_News/2009-10-13/kids-raped-ukrainian-camp.html

The Ukrainian Prosecutor’s Office is dealing with a high-profile case of alleged pedophile orgies at a Ukrainian children’s recreation camp where a deputy and a priest were reportedly involved.

A mother of two kids, a boy and a girl, claims they were raped by their father and her ex-husband, Artek magazine editor-in-chief Dmitry Polyukhovich, the Segodnya newspaper reports.

Yulia Timoshenko Bloc deputy Grigory Omelchenko forwarded the mother’s account of the alleged crime to Ukraine’s President Viktor Yushchenko. He also claims that 32,000 pornographic photos and video files were found on the PC belonging to Polyukhovich.

Earlier Ukrainian parliamentarian Vadim Kolesnichenko, from the Party of the Regions, said the mother of the raped children had contacted him.

“I immediately raised an alarm and we checked that information,” Kolesnichenko said. “Unfortunately, it was confirmed.”

“We are now doing everything to prevent high-ranking officials from avoiding responsibility,” the Party of the Regions press service quoted the deputy as saying.

The parliament member said he contacted law enforcement agencies, the Prosecutor General’s Office and the human rights ombudsman, asking them to prevent the closure of the criminal case, which has already been opened, and not drag it out.

Four more members of the camp staff were named among the alleged criminals, including the head of the institution. Along with them parliament deputy Viktor Ukolov from the Yulia Timoshenko Bloc and Orthodox priest Vadim Payevsky are also on the suspects’ list, Segodnya quotes the kids’ mother as saying.

To date only one of the suspects has been detained.

It has been reported that the father of the raped children has already confessed to the crime and it was he who named Ukolov and Payevsky as suspects. But the mother of the two kids claims prosecutors are not checking into the allegations. She also says the police have twice rejected her attempt to launch a criminal case. According to her, the fact that her kids had been raped was confirmed by medical tests, children psychologists’ analysis and witness’ accounts.

Recreation camp administration: “That’s mere politics”

The director of the Artek International Children’s Center, Boris Novozhilov, said that he considers these actions “games of politicians and a smear campaign.” In his words, the “irresponsible claim” by Kolesnichenko is just speculation.

Novozhilov has called on the politicians to stop using Artek for their own aims.

The administration’s statement says that Kolesnichenko’s “irresponsible behavior” heavily damages the reputation of the recreation center and of Ukraine in general. It insists that such crimes could not possibly have been committed on Artek property.

“This dirty campaign is a logical continuation of the long-term scheming of the light-fingered politicians, whose strategic plans of destroying the unique social and cultural phenomenon known as ‘Artek’ were broken by the center’s current administration,” Novozhilov said.