Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced that if the council approves the proposal, he is ready to sign it immediately. At the same time, he also commented on the end of the positions of Minister of Justice Herman Haluščenko and Minister of Energy Svitlana Hrynčuková.
Haluščenko was conditionally dismissed by the cabinet on Wednesday, Hrynčuková offered her position. According to Reuters, she stated that she had not committed anything illegal. However, the corruption scheme continued even when she was in office.
“I am convinced that neither the Minister of Justice nor the Minister of Energy can remain in their positions. It is, among other things, a matter of trust,” Zelenskyj said.
Ekonomična pravda pointed out that both Haluščenko and Hrynčuková are also members of the National Council for Security and Defense. So far, no decision has been taken that would deal with their further work in the council.
Mindič left Ukraine only shortly before the raid on seven dozen places began. According to the Liga server, he left Ukraine legally, the Ukrainian border service said. At that time, an arrest warrant had not yet been issued for him. She did not even receive any order to prevent him from leaving the country. The investigation lasted 15 months and thousands of hours of intercepted communications were recorded.
The National Anti-corruption Office (NABU) is gradually publishing wiretapping where, however, names are not given, but only pseudonyms. Journalists from the Free Europe group Schem said that Tymur Mindič, who owns the TV studio Kvartal-95, where Ukrainian President Zelensky became famous with his satire, performs under the nickname Karslon. Mindič was his close colleague and friend.
It was Mindič who was supposed to lead the criminal group, he was the head of the so-called laundromats, where money obtained from bribes was laundered, especially during repairs to the energy network and securing power plants against aerial attacks.
In addition, the name of former Deputy Prime Minister Oleksije Černyšev (codename Če Guevara) also figures in the case, according to NABU, he earned 1.2 million dollars and 100,000 euros, Politico reported. Already in the summer, NABU was investigated in another corruption case. It was Mindič who recommended him to Zelenský as a capable man in 2019.
Another suspect is the former Minister of Defense Rustěm Umerov.
Schlagbaum
According to the OCCRP Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, investigators say the group forced suppliers to Enerhoatom to pay ten to fifteen percent of the contract or lose their supplier status or have payments blocked. It was referred to as Schlagbaum (barrier) or barrier.
The office where these payments were accounted for was based in Kyiv and was connected to the family of former pro-Russian Ukrainian MP Andriy Derkač, who was accused of treason and is now a Russian senator.
Payments were forwarded through the network of offshore companies. The OCCRP writes that most of the obtained funds have already left Ukraine. He claims that the criminal group de facto controlled Enerhoatoma, whose annual income is 200 billion hryvnias (100 billion crowns).
