Ex-Premier Lazarenko plans to return to Ukraine - lawyer
KYIV. Nov 2 (Interfax) - Former Ukrainian Prime Minister Pavlo Lazarenko, who was released from a U.S. prison on Thursday, is willing to return home, Lazarenko's lawyer Marina Dolgopolova said.
"Indeed, he wants to return to Ukraine," he told journalists, referring to a recent telephone conversation with her client.
Dolgopolova, however, refused to disclose the circumstances that could accompany Lazarenko's return to Ukraine.
On November 1, Lazarenko was freed from the U.S. Terminal Island prison, where he served a ten-year sentence after being convicted of money laundering, wire fraud and extortion.
Lazarenko initially planned to go straight to his U.S. estate and meet his wife and children following his release from prison.
The Ukrainian Prosecutor General's Office, however, still insists that it will arrest Lazarenko as soon as he returns to Ukraine, where the former prime minister faces up to 50 counts of bribery, misappropriation and abuse of office, Lazarenko's lawyers have said.
In August 2006, a California court convicted Lazarenko of money laundering and wire fraud, committed from 1994 to 1999, and sentenced him to nine years in prison. In June 2011, Lazarenko's term was cut by seven months, making him due for release on January 11, 2013.
However, Federal Bureau of Prisons spokesman Chris Burke was quoted as saying in August 2011 that Lazarenko would be released from prison on November 1, 2012. The ex-prime minister was transferred from the Federal Correctional Institution in Dublin, California, to Terminal Island, a low-security prison for men, which is also located in California.
The Ukrainskaya Pravda news website has reported, citing a Terminal Island employee, that Lazarenko lived in an ordinary barracks, which houses up to 150 prisoners, and was not engaged in any labor activities.
According to Ukrainskaya Pravda, apart from serving his prison term, Lazarenko was held under house arrest for more than five years.