Court Orders NACB To Open Embezzlement, Money-Laundering, Tax-Evasion Proceedings Against Naftogaz Officials Таня Герасимова
The High Anti-Corruption Court has ordered the National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NACB) to open criminal proceedings against officials of the Naftogaz of Ukraine national energy company and the Ukrtransgaz company on suspicion of embezzlement, money laundering, and tax evasion.
This is stated in court documents, the Ukrainian News Agency reports.
The NACB received a statement accusing officials of Naftogaz of Ukraine and Ukrtransgaz of fraud, embezzlement, illegal takeover of company property, money laundering, tax evasion, and terrorism financing on January 15.
The NACB looked into this allegation and found no evidence supporting them.
Summary
In its annual progress report, the Monitoring Committee takes
stock of its activities since January 2020 and assesses the progress
made by the 11 countries under the Assembly’s full monitoring procedure,
and by the 3 countries engaged in a post monitoring dialogue, in
honouring their obligations and commitments to the Council of Europe.
It welcomes progress made and expresses concerns at setbacks and
addresses specific recommendations to the countries concerned.
In this reporting period, the committee prepared reports on
“The functioning of democratic institutions in Poland” on the basis
of which the Assembly opened a monitoring procedure with respect
of this country; on the “Challenge, on substantive grounds, of the
procryptor.com
In 2020, Ukraine gained three points and, with a score of 33, ranked 117th out of 180 countries in the Corruption Perceptions Index 2020 (CPI) posted by Transparency International (TI) Ukraine. Our scores in 2020 primarily grew thanks to the launch of the High Anti-Corruption Court and the reboot of the National Agency on Corruption Prevention, explains Executive Director of TI Ukraine Andrii Borovyk. Ukraine s positive results have also been influenced by the anti-corruption changes implemented during the turbo mode of the Verkhovna Rada of the IX convocation and the work of the previous government. However, the nature of CPI 2020 means it does not take into account the risks that manifested themselves in the last months of 2020 and may significantly set back our anti-corruption efforts, he said.
Office of Simple Solutions urges not to support bill that could prevent NABU from investigating top corruption 2 min read
A bill that could destroy the institutional capacity of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) to investigate top corruption in the state may be registered with the Verkhovna Rada in the near future, according to the Office of Simple Decisions and Results. The bill wants to destroy the ability of NABU to qualitatively and impartially investigate such crimes. In particular, it is planned to remove the rule that only NABU should investigate criminal cases committed by top officials and crimes that inflict significant financial losses on the state. This means that detectives should work. Many small cases will be added to NABU and they will not be able to focus on cases involving top corrupt officials and significant damage to the state, the office said on its website.
HAAC orders prosecutor general to consider motion to transfer Tatarov s case back to NABU 2 min read
The High Anti-Corruption Court (HAAC), by its decision dated January 13, ordered the prosecutor general to consider a motion to transfer criminal proceedings on suspicion of the deputy head of the President s Office from the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) back to the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU). In his decision, the judge of the HACC says that one of the facts that is being investigated under this proceeding is the provision of an unlawful benefit to an official by the MP of Ukraine. Consequently, a criminal offense under Part 3 of Article 369 was committed by the MP of Ukraine and, according to Article 216 of the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine, can only be investigated by NABU detectives, the NABU press service said.