Police in the Ukrainian city of Konotop have launched an attempted murder investigation after the city's former mayor, Artem Semenikhin, was brutally beaten in the early hours of June 27.
The Konotop police department said in a statement posted on its website that Semenikhin was hospitalized and placed in intensive care after unknown assailants severely beat him as he was traveling home.
Semenikhin, 37, who served as mayor of Konotop from 2015 to 2018, was attacked two days after he registered himself as an independent candidate in snap parliamentary elections scheduled for July 21.
A deputy of the northern Sumy region council, Olena Serdyuk, posted a photo showing Semenikhin's face covered in blood as he laid on a hospital gurney on her Facebook account. She also urged the chief of police to take control of the investigation and said that the attack against him was politically motivated.
