Sweden has detained former Ukrainian MP from the Party of Regions, Dmytro Sviatash.
Sviatash is currently being held at the Migration Agency’s temporary detention centre in Mörsta, European Pravda reports, citing Expressen.
The former MP arrived in Sweden last week. His lawyer said Sviatash came to Stockholm for a Stevie Wonder concert. Border police detained him during passport control and barred him from entering the country. Sviatash holds Russian and Ukrainian citizenship, but presented a Ukrainian passport to border officers.
According to his lawyer, the entry ban was formally imposed due to a Polish decision prohibiting re-entry, which was entered into the Schengen Area database.
In an appeal, the lawyer stated that Sviatash opposes extradition to Ukraine.
- In the summer of 2024, a Ukrainian court sentenced Dmytro Sviatash in absentia to 12 years in prison for justifying Russian aggression and for fraud involving 2.2 billion hryvnias.
- In addition, since 2023 police have suspected him of high treason.
- Sviatash fled Ukraine in 2019 and has lived in Russia ever since.
Who Is Dmytro Sviatash
- In 2002, he was elected as a 4th-convocation MP from the “For a United Ukraine!” bloc in constituency No. 171 (Kharkiv) as a member of the People’s Democratic Party.
- In 2004, during Ukraine’s presidential election, he served as an authorised representative of candidate Viktor Yanukovych.
- In 2006, he also ran for the Kharkiv City Council on the Party of Regions list.
- In 2006 and 2007, he was elected as an MP on the Party of Regions lists, at No. 63 and No. 122 respectively.
- In 2012, he was elected as a 7th-convocation MP from the Party of Regions in the same constituency.
- That same year, he voted for the “language” law that expanded the use of the Russian language. In 2014, he was elected as an 8th-convocation MP in constituency No. 170 (Kharkiv) as an independent self-nominated candidate. In 2015, he joined the parliamentary group “Party ‘Vidrodzhennia’”. He was a member of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Tax and Customs Policy. Since 2014, he has been a member of the party “Vidrodzhennia”.
- He voted for the so-called “dictatorship laws” on 16 January 2014.
- From 2005 to 2014, he was a member of the Party of Regions.
- In 2019, Sviatash ran as a candidate for MP from the “Opposition Platform — For Life” but did not win a seat in parliament.
- That same year, he was placed on a wanted list in a case involving fraud and document forgery. Even then, it was reported that the former MP had fled to the Russian Federation.
- In 2022, prosecutors transferred to the state assets belonging to former Party of Regions MP Dmytro Sviatash worth more than 600 million hryvnias.