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Automatically translated version. May contain inaccuracies compared to the original.
We had barely recovered from the NABU investigation codenamed "Forest Gump"—the first episode—and the second, appropriately, was "Themis"—when anti-corruption law enforcement gave us more reasons to widen our eyes.
The fault this time may potentially lie with employees of the Office of the Prosecutor General, who likely shielded the "offices." Read more in my exclusive column for 24 Channel.
Details of NABU's latest high-profile disclosure
I think this term needs no detailed explanation. But I will remind you anyway: you or your relatives have probably dealt with calls from unknown numbers. The bank wants to confirm something, then asks for a code on the back of the card, you supposedly won 400 thousand hryvnias, but you must buy or pay for something. In short, the latest fraud.
Thus, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office uncovered a criminal organization led by the head of the structural divisions of the Office of the Prosecutor General. Participants in the organization engaged in shielding fraudulent call centers, earning multi-million revenues.
Participants established a mechanism of systematic bribe-taking for not hindering the activities of call centers that committed fraudulent actions against Ukrainian citizens and foreigners, reports NABU.
FIVE participants of the criminal organization have been identified so far. Investigative actions continue. Other possible participants are being established.
The proceeds were laundered through a series of schemes.
Over 12 million hryvnias comprise assets that the organization’s leader laundered by re-registering them to third parties to conceal real ownership. Specifically, this includes real estate in a popular apartment complex near the Carpathians.
Over 10 million UAH the group members placed on bank accounts of their relatives under the guise of legitimate income allegedly earned from entrepreneurial activity.
According to the investigation, more than 20 million hryvnias were spent on purchasing real estate, jewelry, and valuable movable property.
That’s 20 million! And instead of expensive trinkets for Iryna Mudryi as a collateral, as much would still be needed; no one was willing to put up the full amount as collateral for the Deputy Head of the Office of the President. Who knew.
Who is this "Andriyovych" who is called the "boss"?
At least some "Andriyovych" was known, whom the Chancellor—the main figure in the investigation—calls the "boss." In a strange coincidence, the country’s top prosecutor, Ruslan Kravchenko, is also patronymically "Andriyovych."
Even more of a coincidence is that Ruslan Andriyovych cannot be found since NABU searches. At least, that is what investigative journalist Mykhailo Tach of the Ukrainian Truth claims.
According to him, from Friday to Saturday no one could find the Attorney General of Ukraine. He drove into the government quarter and was seen no more. The last known location is the Office of the President, writes Mykhailo Tach.
To quote this message: "the General Prosecutor's Office denied the Ukraine Pravda news about searches of Kravchenko. They probably think that if the Prosecutor General hid, the searches don’t count? At such a high level—this is probably the first such case," writes the journalist. He cites sources in political circles.
In the Office of the Prosecutor General they acknowledged that NABU detectives conducted searches in the official premises used by Prosecutor General Ruslan Kravchenko, his first deputy Maryia Vdovychko, and other OGP employees.
"Regarding the Office of the Prosecutor General employee who figures in the NABU investigation, the question of his dismissal from the prosecutors’ bodies is being resolved. The Office of the Prosecutor General, in its part, will provide the investigation with the necessary cooperation and legally prescribed information. At the same time, the same strict compliance with the law, procedural guarantees, and limits of court permissions must be ensured by all law enforcement agencies… The Prosecutor General's position is principled: the status of a prosecutor cannot be a way to avoid accountability or to shield possible criminal activity," the OGP statement says.
Did the president and the Prosecutor General know about the schemes?
See? No one knew anything.
The president didn’t know that his Office was gathering a bail for Galushchenko and "washing" money through Sense Bank.
The Prosecutor General, too, probably didn’t know that his employee is laundering tens of millions of hryvnias and buying a Musi watch with them, worth, as they say, "income for a year".
Nobody knows anything. You just pay taxes honestly, donate to the Defense Forces, try to set something aside, believe in a bright future.
And you and I will continue, like urban lunatics, to fight for this country. Because it needs us. Not them, because the scandal participants, it seems, need a coat, a bag, a status—an artificial status, by the way.
Corruption during wartime really gnaws at our country.
But on the other hand, we will look at this situation as a light at the end of the tunnel. Because corruption in wartime really gnaws at our country and deprives it of unity. Therefore, such work by anti-corruption bodies is, so to speak, gold-worthy. It reveals crimes that we certainly do not need—neither in war nor in peace.
And the defendants, if their guilt is proven in court, should face just punishment.
And finally regarding the claim I often saw in social networks: that NABU deliberately makes such investigations public before negotiations. Perhaps fans of this theory should appeal to the corrupt and ask them not to steal during the bargaining process. But that is only a suggestion.
Document: PDF proof of the original version of the news item "Країна потрібна нам, а не їм: що важливо пам’ятати після чергового корупційного скандалу". It records the publication content at the moment of the first scan, the preservation date and the source: Channel 24.
