Ukrainian anti-corruption activist Kateryna Handziuk died on Sunday from injuries suffered in an acid attack, increasing pressure on officials who are accused of doing little to stop violence against the country’s embattled civil society. The 33-year-old Handzyuk, who was known for her scathing criticism of police corruption, was doused with sulfuric acid outside of her Kherson home on July 31 by an unknown attacker. “I appeal to law enforcement officers to do everything possible so that the murderers of Kateryna Gandzyuk are found, put on trial and punished,”

“Katya’s death is a judgement of the system, with all its “reforms,” empty bravado, worthless praise...” wrote Yulia Timoshenko in her Twitter micro blog. Ms Handziuk (33) died on Sunday, three months after someone poured sulphuric acid over her head outside her home in the southern city of Kherson, where she was an adviser to the mayor and campaigned against police and political corruption. Dozens of civil society groups, meanwhile, jointly demanded the sacking of Kherson police chiefs for “sabotaging the investigation into the attack” on Ms Handziuk, as well as the resignation of Ukraine’s interior minister and prosecutor general for “sabotaging the reform of law-enforcement agencies in Ukraine”.
Kateryna Handzyuk, an anti-corruption activist, dies of the injuries that she suffered in an acid attack on 31 July in Kherson.