Russian investigators said on Thursday they had raided the library of Ukrainian literature in Moscow and detained its 58-year-old head, with ties between the two ex-Soviet neighbours in tatters. Four of them were held in the captivity of the “DPR”, another five were held in the “LPR” captivity.
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Police found several books which, although not illegal in Ukraine, are either written by authors whose catalogues are banned in Russian Federation or contain images pertaining to Ukrainian nationalism which have been made illegal in Russian Federation since the start of the Ukraine crisis.
Police also seized commendation notices issued by Ukraine’s former presidents Viktor Yushchenko, a Western-leaning leader, and Viktor Yanukovych, who was backed by Moscow, from the home of the library director, UNIAN reported.
Russia’s powerful Investigative Committee said a criminal case against Natalya Sharina had been opened and investigations were continuing.
The Ukrainian foreign ministry has complained at the treatment the library and its staff have received and asked Moscow to immediately “cease its stifling of the library’s work” in an official statement.
The foreign ministry in Kiev said that Russian authorities had already looked for “extremist literature” in the library in 2010 and 2011.
“We call on the Russian authorities to halt pressure on the work of the library – a cultural centre of a thousands-strong Ukrainian community”.
Police officers seized documents, electronic data storage devices and “some literature” from the library on Moscow’s Trifonovskaya Ulitsa, an unidentified law-enforcement official was quoted as saying by the capital’s Moskva news portal.
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Relations between Russian Federation and Ukraine have been soured by Russia’s annexation of Crimea in March 2014 and its support for separatist rebels fighting government troops in eastern Ukraine.
