KIEV, Oct. 13 – Ukraine’s authorities will investigate whether a $405 million debt owed by former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko’s company to the Russian government had played a role in her signing a controversial natural gas contract in January 2009.

Tymoshenko was sentenced to seven years in prison on Tuesday for ordering Naftogaz Ukrayiny to sign the contract with Gazprom, triggering a wave of international pressure on President Viktor Yanukovych.

U.S. and EU officials believe the case against Tymoshenko was politically motivated and have demanded the Ukrainian authorities to release her.

Although there were signs that the authorities may have been seeking to arrange the release of Tymoshenko before October 20, a new investigation may eventually increase the former prime minister’s legal problems.

“Tymoshenko is accused of while being the president and the actual owner of the United Energy Systems of Ukraine, under a collusion with former Prime Minister Pavlo Lazarenko, has committed an attempt to trigger state budget spending worth $405 million,” Ivan Derevyanko, the head of the investigation department at the SBU security service, said at a press conference on Thursday.

The investigation was opened on Wednesday, a day after Tymoshenko was sentenced to seven years in prison for ordering the singing of the controversial gas agreement.

SBU’s investigation comes in response to a letter from the Russian Defense Ministry in June that urges the Ukrainian government to pay the $405 million debt, owed by the United Energy Systems, from state budget funds.

The government, lewd by then Prime Minister Lazarenko, guaranteed the United Energy System’s debts, and when the company had gone bankrupt in 1997, the debt appeared to be a liability for the Ukrainian government.

SBU believes Tymoshenko may have used the company’s money - through a network of offshore registered companies, for example Somalli Enterprises – to pay bribes to Lazarenko and to wire money to the account that she secretly controlled.

Tymoshenko may face up to 12 years in prison if she is proved guilty in the new trial, Derevyanko said.

Oleksandr Turchynov, the No. 2 in Tymoshenko’s Batkivshyna party, said the new investigation was an attempt to put additional pressure on Tymoshenko.

“The new investigation is done to prevent Yulia Tymoshenko from getting out of jail,” Turchynov said.

He said the debt owned by the United Energy Systems was dating back 15 years ago, and that the case must have been cancelled after 10 years. “Russia was not demanding any compensation for the past 15 years,” Turchynov said.

But Derevyanko said that the case cannot be cancelled because Tymoshenko “has committed a crime in January 2009, and that’s why the case could have only be cancelled after 2019.” (tl/ez)