‘There’s no hiding, even in Africa’: Ukraine sends warning to new Russian ambassador to Cape Verde, wanted in Kiev for treason

Kiev has issued a warning shot to former Ukrainian Prosecutor General Natalia Poklonskaya after she accepted a job from Moscow as Ambassador to Cape Verde. She is wanted on high treason charges after defecting to Russia in 2014.

Now, Kiev has appealed to the authorities, making it clear to the government in Praia that Poklonskaya is facing several criminal cases in Ukraine.

“The former prosecutor of the Russian occupation administration in Crimea is wanted for treason against our state,” said Oleg Mykolenko, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesman. “She is under sanctions from Ukraine, the EU, the US, Canada and Japan. There is no hiding, even in Africa.”

Poklonskaya, who left Ukraine in 2014, gained notoriety for her active pro-Moscow stance during the Maidan events and the reabsorption of Crimea. Her defection and subsequent roles in the Russian government have caused her to be a target of Kiev, and she has been charged with treason.

She later became an MP in the State Duma, but chose not to run again in last month’s elections. On Wednesday, President Vladimir Putin signed a decree appointing her as ambassador to Cape Verde, an island located off the Atlantic Coast of Africa.

Following her appointment, she spoke of her delight, calling diplomatic work her “dream” job.

 “I’ve been getting to know the country in absentia,” she said. “I know that it is a beautiful country, that there are kind and hardworking people there, that it is a friendly country and that it is necessary to strengthen our good relations.”

Following Ukraine’s warning shot, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova called on Kiev to mind its own business.

“Let them first try to apply Ukrainian justice on the territory of Ukraine, and then they will take on Africa,” Zakharova wrote on her Telegram channel.

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