PRESS RELEASE
Neo-Nazi Right Sector Leader Offered Post in Defense Ministry
March 27, 2015 (EIRNS)—According to Sputnik news, Ukrainian media, citing Member of Parliament and Ministry of Interior advisor Anton Gerashchenko, has reported that Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has offered neo-Nazi Right Sector leader Dmitri Yarosh a post in the Ministry of Defense.
"I can confirm that Dmitri Yarosh has received a proposal from the President to take up a position in the Ministry of Defense. I personally would welcome it if Yarosh were to come to work in the public sector," Gerashchenko said on Thursday evening, speaking on Ukraine’s Channel 5.
"I’ll say, moreover, that Yarosh feels bored in the Parliament. Plus, he was seriously wounded in battle. I would love to work with him in creating a voluntary defense association in Ukraine along the lines of the Estonian, Finnish, or Swiss systems,"
Gerashchenko added.
Yarosh’s responsibilities are to include the coordination of volunteer units with the Ukrainian military in eastern Ukraine.
Earlier this week, Right Forces battalion leaders confirmed that they have been offered to join the Ukrainian National Guard, agreeing on the condition that their units’ structure and leadership would be preserved intact, Expert.ru explains.
Right Sector’s Ukrainian Volunteer Corps includes two battalions operating in eastern Ukraine, as well as eight reserve battalions throughout the rest of the country.
In March 2014, Russian authorities issued an arrest warrant against Yarosh for incitement of terrorism, and for his organization’s combat operations in the First Chechen War against the Russian military.
While claiming that Yarosh’s appointment would bring the neo-Nazi volunteer units under control of the Ukrainian military, the opposite is true. The Ukrainian military will be brought under the influence of the neo-Nazis, particularly in eastern Ukraine, where they are deployed.
Immediately after the Minsk agreement was reached on Feb. 12, 2015, Yarosh declared that the Right Sector rejected the Minsk agreement, and that its paramilitary units would continue actively fighting. At that time, Yarosh claimed the agreement had no legal force, and claimed that it was contrary to Ukraine’s constitution.
