More than 15 months after President Viktor Yanukovych fled power, prosecutors are just now getting around to taking action in criminal investigations against his former allies.
Prosecutors have asked courts to try, in absentia, former Deputy Prime Minister Serhiy Arbuzov and ex-Health Minister Raisa Bohatyryova, as well as against her suspected accomplice Oleksandr Stashchenko, Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin said in an interview with Golos Ukrainy, the Verkhovna Rada’s newspaper, published on June 16.
If the courts give their permission, the first-ever corruption cases against top allies of Yanukovych will be submitted to court.
Apart from these cases, several Yanukovych allies are on trial for a violent crackdown on EuroMaidan Revolution demonstrators in 2013-2014.
The report comes as Shokin is accused of dragging his feet on high-profile corruption cases and failing to prevent the flight from Ukraine earlier this month of lawmaker Serhiy Klyuyev, also a Yanukovych associate.
It is hard to predict the time between asking a court to initiate a trial in absentia and sending a case to the court, a high-ranking prosecutor not authorized to speak to the press said by phone, adding that it could range from a week to two months.
“A big step will be made when an indictment is sent to court,” Daryna Kalenyuk, executive director of the Anti-Corruption Action Center, told the Kyiv Post.
However, courts may or may not authorize the trials in absentia, and everything depends on how professional prosecutors’ documents are, she said.
Shokin said on June 15 at a meeting with Geoffrey Pyatt, the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, that prosecutors had initiated trials in absentia against four top Yanukovych officials. It was not clear whether he was referring to Bohatyroyva and Arbuzov. He said then that three more trials in absentia would be launched soon.
Andriy Demartino, a spokesman for the Prosecutor General’s Office, was not available by phone.
Bohatyryova and Arbuzov are wanted by Interpol.
Bohatyryova and Stashchenko are accused of embezzling Hr 6.5 million during purchases of medical equipment, while Arbuzov is suspected of embezzling Hr 118 million at the National Bank of Ukraine.
Accounts worth Hr 200 million belonging to Arbuzov and his wife have been frozen, Shokin said.
In another blow to ex-Yanukovych allies, Borys Tymonkin, a top executive linked to tycoon Serhiy Kurchenko, has been arrested in Germany, Ukrainska Pravda reported on June 16, citing Ukraine’s embassy in Germany.
Tymonkin is a deputy chairman of the board of directors of Kurchenko’s VETEK energy group.
Germany’s Interior Ministry declined to comment, while the country’s federal police was not available by phone.
Tymonkin is wanted in Ukraine on charges of creating a criminal gang. He is accused of organizing a money laundering and embezzlement scheme for Kurchenko, Ukrainian lawyer and businessman Anatolii Bashlovka wrote on Facebook on June 16.
Serhiy Klyuyev, who is wanted on embezzlement and fraud charges and fled Ukraine earlier in June, was luckier than Tymonkin.
Prosecutors, the State Security Service and their supporters have cited legal technicalities such as the need for authorization from the Verkhovna Rada and a court to track Klyuyev as justification for their failure to prevent his flight.
Kalenyuk dismissed this as a poor excuse, saying that nothing would have prevented law enforcement agencies from requesting court authorization to track Klyuyev’s aides and bodyguards.
The Prosecutor General’s Office has also been lambasted for failing to request Klyuyev’s arrest from the Verkhovna Rada and to include some strong charges against him in the request to strip him of immunity.
Kyiv Post staff writer Oleg Sukhov can be reached at [email protected].
