On January 26, 2026, the HACC Appeals Chamber partially overturned the investigating judge’s ruling on the interim measure imposed on Yuliia Tymoshenko, head of the Batkivshchyna parliamentary faction and a suspect in an attempted bribery of MPs, following an appeal by the defense. 

The Appeals Chamber issued a new ruling refusing to impose the obligations not to leave Kyiv and Kyiv region and prohibiting communication with MPs. In all other respects, the HACC investigating judge’s decision—under which Tymoshenko was released on bail of UAH 33.3 million—was left unchanged.

The remaining requests in both the defence appeal and the prosecutor’s appeal were dismissed. 

At the start of the hearing, the defense argued that HACC investigating judge Vitalii Dubas had unlawfully considered the motion on the interim measure because the rules on automated case assignment in the first-instance court had allegedly been violated. The defense also insisted that NABU’s recordings were falsified and asked the court to order an expert examination and request the original recordings.

The prosecutor objected, stating that there had been no violations of automated case assignment and that the defense had not sought Judge Dubas’s recusal during the first-instance proceedings. He also said that all procedural requirements for entering information into the Unified Register of Pre-Trial Investigations had been met, and that the covertly recorded conversations contain no signs of provocation.

In the appellate proceedings, the prosecutor asked the court to set bail at UAH 50 million and require Tymoshenko to wear an electronic monitoring bracelet. He noted that the suspect is a fairly wealthy person and has sufficient funds to pay bail in full. He also disagreed with the first-instance investigating judge’s reasoning for refusing to impose electronic monitoring.

In response to questions from the panel as to why the prosecution had not documented the actual transfer of unlawful benefit and instead served suspicion on the MP after the offer had been made, the prosecutor replied that an offer of a bribe is itself a standalone offense. That, he said, is part of the prosecution’s tactical approach to achieving the aims of criminal proceedings, and he is not obliged to disclose its details. 

For its part, the defense asked the court to overturn the investigating judge’s ruling and apply no interim measure to Tymoshenko.

The defense called the prosecutor’s proposed bail amount unfounded and the risks “invented.” The lawyers also argued that information was entered into the URPTI after the events imputed to Tymoshenko and said the investigating judge, in their view, had groundlessly linked the risks to the fact that the suspect is a public figure and a well-known politician.

In her statement, Tymoshenko spoke of political repression and said the case is being used to eliminate the political force she leads “ahead of” elections. Speaking of political repression, she claimed that NABU are merely the executors but did not name any specific “commissioners” when asked by the court.

During the hearing, Tymoshenko also read out excerpts of the covertly recorded conversations, stating that the voice on the tapes was not hers. She described the recordings as “a conversation between two idiots and a mentally ill person,” stressing that such language is not characteristic of her.