MINSK – The Belarusian State Security Committee (KGB) has confirmed the detention of the Minsk Tractor Works’ main metallurgist, Andrei Karas, and the director of the Ukrainian Zavod Obvazhniuvachiv (Weighting Agents Plant), Oleksandr Skyba.
“The Republic of Belarus’ KGB caught the main metallurgist of Minsk Tractor Works, Karas, red-handed receiving a bribe in the amount of $2,800 from the chairman of the board of the PJSC Weighting Agents Plant [Ukraine], Ukrainian citizen Skyba, as part of the fight against corruption and economic crime,” the KGB said in a statement posted on its official website.
Karas’ son acted as a mediator in the bribery, the KGB said.
“The taking a $1,700 bribe from representatives of commercial organizations by the head of the logistics department of Minsk Tractor Works, Vasily Mezga, was also recorded,” it said.
Over 20 instances of corrupt activity on the part of officials of Minsk Tractor Works totaling more than $40,000 were uncovered, the KGB said.
Criminal cases for bribe-taking were initiated against the plant’s employees and against Skyba for bribing.
“All persons involved in the corrupt schemes have been detained,” the KGB said.
A restrictive measure in the form of detainment was imposed.
The criminal cases were forwarded to the Belarusian State Committee for further proceedings.
Several Belarusian media outlets earlier reported Karas’ and Skyba’s detention.
According to reports, the director of Weighting Agents Plant (located in the city of Kostiantynivka, Ukraine’s Donetsk region), Oleksandr Skyba, born on May 7 1978, arrived in Minsk for talks at Minsk Tractor Works, with which the Ukrainian enterprise has an agreement on the supply of goods used at the Belarusian plant, on Nov.15.
Skyba left Kyiv by plane at 2:20 p.m. on Nov. 15 and arrived in Minsk at 4:15 p.m. local time. He was supposed to return to Ukraine the same evening. However, he got in touch only the next morning; Skyba called his wife from a Belarusian number and said that Belarusian KGB officials had detained him.
The Ukrainian embassy in Minsk requested that the Belarusian Foreign Ministry explain the reasons and circumstances of the detention of the Ukrainian citizen during his business trip to Belarus.
