When a Virginia court convicted Paul Manafort, U.S. President Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman, on charges of tax and bank fraud and concealing foreign bank accounts, a certain Ukrainian politician felt a surge of vindication. Serhiy Leshchenko, a member of the Ukrainian parliament and a former journalist, revealed the existence in 2016 of the so-called “black ledger”—a list of secret payments made by Ukraine’s pro-Russian Party of Regions to Manafort and others. The list detailed the vast sums Manafort earned as a political consultant abroad, some of which he concealed from U.S. authorities. Foreign Policy caught up by phone recently with Leshchenko in Redondo Beach, California, where he is on a swing through U.S. national parks with his family. He talked about his efforts to purge Ukrainian politics of corrupt money, the significance of Manafort’s conviction, and the lingering questions about Manafort’s ties to Moscow.
Viktor Yanukovych
Foreign Policy: The Ukrainian who sunk Paul Manafort
From left: Kateryna Ryzhenko, a legal advisor at Transparency International Ukraine, Daria Kaleniuk, an expert with the Anti-Corruption Action Center, lawmaker and former investigative journalist Sergii Leshchenko, investigative journalist Denys Bihus of Bihus.info, and Prosecutor General's Office spokesman Andriy Lysenko discuss asset recovery cases at the fifth annual MezhyhiryaFest on June 9.
