AFP/Berlin
Imprisoned Ukrainian opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko’s daughter is appealing to the German government to “save my mother’s life” as the former premier began a second week on hunger strike.“Save my mother’s life before it’s too late,” Yevgenia Tymoshenko says in the appeal to appear today in the German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.“My mother’s fate and that of my country are one and the same. If she dies, democracy also dies,” Yevgenia, 32, says in the appeal, adding that her mother, who reportedly has a slipped disc, was “very weak”.Tymoshenko, 51, began serving a seven-year sentence for abuse of power at a prison in eastern Kharkiv in August 2011.She declared a hunger strike to protest her alleged beating by three prison wardens who took her against her will for treatment at a state hospital.Her supporters have released photographs purportedly showing two large bruises on Tymoshenko’s abdomen and several more on her left arm that they say confirm the prison attack.The saga surrounding the 2004 “Orange Revolution” leader’s health and her refusal to be treated by Ukrainian doctors for fear of being infected with a disease or poisoned has raged for months.Her lawyer said Tymoshenko believes the use of force was authorised by Ukrainian Prosecutor-General Viktor Pshonka “under orders from President Viktor Yanukovych”.