Ukraine's ex-interior minister jailed for 4 years

A Ukrainian court on Monday sentenced a former interior minister and close ally of jailed opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko to four years in prison on embezzlement and abuse-of-office charges. 

Yuri Lutsenko, 47, a member of opposition party Narodna Samooborona (People's Self-defence) had denied the charges as politically motivated.  

Tymoshenko, a former prime minister in whose government Lutsenko had served, was also convicted for abuse of office last October and sentenced to seven years in prison in a case that has damaged Ukraine's ties with the West. 

The European Union and the United States say Tymoshenko's jailing and the prosecution of Lutsenko were politically motivated and examples of selective justice.

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