Jewish-Ukrainian politician Gennady Korban, who is charged with being involved in organised crime, has compared his case to a famous 1913 blood libel trial in which a Russian Jew was accused of ritual murder.

Mr Korban, who served under Jewish oligarch Igor Kolomoisky as deputy governor of the Dnepropetrovsk region until early 2015, and currently heads the UKROP political party, told a Kiev court this week: "History repeats itself. Here in Kiev in 1913, a trial of the Jew Menahem Mendel Beilis took place… He was accused of eating babies, and God knows what else."

The Jewish community issued a statement accusing the government of "kidnapping" the politician, who has been recovering from heart surgery.