Viktor Handzyuk, the father of killed Kherson activist Kateryna Handzyuk, has said the mastermind of her murder is connected with the head of the regional council, Vladylasv Manher, and the head of the regional state administration, Andriy Hordeyev.

"I do not care whether the corrupt Interior Ministry, the indifferent Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) or prosecution have any concrete evidence against those who ordered the murder. I do not care how all these people are going to lie that they do not have authority to punish the guilty. I do not care. I only know that when the mastermind of the murder, the crime boss who was recently released from prison, closely cooperates with the head of the Kherson regional council, Fatherland party member Vladyslav Manher; when the crime boss closely cooperates with the chairman of the Kherson regional state administration, Petro Poroshenko Bloc member Andriy Hordeyev; when the crime boss closely cooperates with Hordeyev's deputy Yevhen Ryshchuk, these people must disappear from the political horizon. They have been compromised for good," he said at a meeting of the parliamentary ad hoc committee.

He said that for him both Fatherland and the Petro Poroshenko Bloc were to blame for his daughter's murder.

"But I still believe that our country is changing. I believe that those who ordered, organized and carried out the murder will be punished. I believe that neither Petro Poroshenko nor Yuliya Tymoshenko is ready to run in elections in blood. I believe that they will hear the pain of the father who lost his only daughter and that they will get rid of any connections to the cynical murder of my Katya. I believe that here and now they mark the line, they will show that there are lines that should not be crossed. I believe that in this country the perpetrators will finally be punished and everyone will get what they deserve," Viktor Handzyuk said.

Kateryna Handzyuk died in hospital on 4 November 2018 two months after she was attacked with acid in central Kherson.