Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych has sent a formal nomination to parliament to approve Viktor Pshonka as the nation's new Prosecutor General, the president's press service announced on Nov. 3.
If approved by parliament, Pshonka, currently a deputy head of the General Prosecutor’s Office, will replace Oleksandr Medvedko, the outgoing General Prosecutor General.
Pshonko served as deputy proseuctor general under Hennadiy Vasyliev in 2003 before retiring in December 2004. He returned as deputy prosecutor under Medvedko at the end of 2006, overseeing pre-trial investigations and the prosecutor general office’s search activities for wanted criminals. Pshonko is currently a member of the High Council of Justice, which is reponsible for disciplining court judges.
Medvedko was first named prosecutor general in November 2005, and was renamed to the post in 2007. Like his predecessors, he failed to bring any top officials to justice despite massive evidence of wrongdoing – nor has he solved any of the long list of resonant crimes that have haunted the country since independence.
Medvedko served as Donetsk Region prosecutor from 1992 to 1999. Between 1999 and 2001 he headed the Donetsk Regional Prosecutor’s Office’s directorate for legal oversight of investigations. Medvedko worked in 2002 as first deputy prosecutor in Luhansk Oblast before being appointed deputy prosecutor general and moving to Kyiv.
