KIEV, July 12 (Xinhua) -- Ambassadors of the group of seven (G7) to Ukraine tweeted Friday that they support the prosecution of those who abuse their power, but ask to note the difference between the current situation and that after 2014 in Ukraine.
"Electoral change and political rotation are the norm in democracies. Indiscriminate bans on all participants in executive and legislative governance are not," said the ambassadors in a statement on Twitter.
These remarks are a reaction to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's proposal for the lustration law to be extended to former President Petro Poroshenko and senior officials during his presidency. Zelensky won a landslide victory in April this year against Poroshenko.
The bill expanding the provisions of the lustration law was presented by the president's team to the Ukrainian parliament.
"This bill is only a public assessment of their activities," Zelensky was quoted by Ukraine's UNIAN news agency as saying in a video message posted on Facebook.
According to Zelensky, the decision is prompted by what he has seen during his tenure.
"I think the least that can be done now is to deprive them of any opportunity to govern the country for good," Zelensky said.
Ukrainian and foreign experts criticized Zelensky's bill amendment.
The lustration law provides the exclusion from public office of civil servants who worked under former President Viktor Yanukovych and also applies to civil servants who were active in the Communist Party of the Soviet Union prior to 1991.
In February 2014, the parliament voted to dismiss Yanukovych from his post, declaring him "constitutionally unable to carry out his duties" after Yanukovych left Kiev, following months of street protests over his refusal to sign an association agreement with the European Union.
A court in Kiev in January this year found Yanukovych guilty of high treason and complicity in conducting an "aggressive war against Ukraine by Russia," local media reported.
