The chief of Ukraine’s Supreme Court was formally arrested Thursday, as prosecutors indicated in a second day of hearings {that a} high-level corruption case was increasing to incorporate a wider circle of judges.
Prosecutors additionally accused a lawyer of performing as an middleman in paying a bribe to the chief justice, and stated that a minimum of three different judges of the court docket had been discovered holding 1000’s of {dollars} in forex marked by investigators.
The chief justice, Vsevolod Knyazev, was apprehended simply after midnight Tuesday by officers of the National Anti-corruption Bureau of Ukraine, who searched his dwelling and workplace in simultaneous raids and stated they discovered giant sums of money in U.S. forex.
In movies of court docket hearings Wednesday and Thursday, posted on the High Anti-Corruption Court’s YouTube channel, Mr. Knyazev appeared within the courtroom sporting a shiny blue sweater and flanked by his attorneys. The High Council of Justice on Thursday lifted his immunity from prosecution, opening the way in which for his formal arrest.
Mr. Knyazev has been charged with graft in a public workplace, and accused of accepting a bribe of $1.8 million to affect a case in favor of a Ukrainian oligarch, Kostyantyn Zhevago. A prosecutor stated Mr. Knyazev had despatched a message to the lawyer in early May to separate the cash into a minimum of 14 separate baggage, and later despatched a message saying he had handed the cash to different judges.
The Anti-Corruption Court’s prosecutor, Oleksandr Omelchenko, informed the court docket that officers had tracked the cost of the primary tranche of the bribe on May 3, and raided Mr. Knyazev’s dwelling half an hour after a second tranche was handed over on Monday night.
The anti-corruption bureau had infiltrated the group making the bribe and marked the notes used within the cost. Officers found $1.8 million in money at Mr. Knyazev’s dwelling and workplace, however the prosecutor stated that not all of the bribe cash, totaling $2.7 million, had been recovered.
Mr. Zhevago, at the moment in France, has been preventing extradition to Ukraine, the place he confronted prices of embezzlement and cash laundering in a separate case. He has denied involvement within the bribery case.
Oleh Horestkyi, the lawyer performing for the oligarch, was apprehended with Mr. Knyazev within the act of handing over a part of the bribe on Tuesday. He was detained for 60 days by the court docket, the particular anti-corruption prosecutor stated in a press release.
The case has shocked and dismayed members of Ukraine’s judiciary. Two Supreme Court judges in interviews lamented the injury to the repute of the court docket and the judiciary. They stated they labored by means of the evening and most of Tuesday to organize a poll through which 140 of the 142 Supreme Court judges voted to take away Mr. Knyazev from his put up. The two judges spoke on situation of anonymity, due to their place as members of the court docket.
With continued Western assist in addition to eventual membership within the European Union and NATO at stake, President Volodymyr Zelensky has made a present of cracking down on Ukraine’s endemic corruption. In January, quite a few officers had been dismissed, together with a deputy minister within the presidential workplace who was accused of collaborating in a $400,000 bribe.
But members of anti-corruption organizations welcomed the investigation as an indication that Ukraine’s anti-corruption regulation enforcement was proving its resilience even throughout a battle.
“I am happy that this happened because it shows that these institutions are independent and they can bring anybody to justice,” stated Andriy Borovyk, government director of Transparency International Ukraine.
The Supreme Court judges’ swift removing of Mr. Knyazev was additionally an indication of accountability, stated Vitalii Shabunin, director of the board of the Anti-Corruption Action Center, a nonprofit.
“The good news is that the institution by itself is ready to resolve the problem,” he stated.
The bureau stated in a press release that the bribe was made on behalf of Mr. Zhevago in a dispute over the possession of 40 % of the shares of the Poltava Mining and Processing Plant, Ferrexpo. The court docket determined the case within the oligarch’s favor in April 2023, it stated.
Mr. Shabunin stated that the prosecution of such a high-level case was proof that the anti-corruption establishments established since Ukraine’s “revolution of dignity” in 2014 had been working correctly. Recent appointments to the our bodies had been carried out pretty and transparently, he stated.
But he stated different establishments had been dragging their ft. In specific, he stated, Ukraine’s Parliament ought to reinstate the system of declaration of belongings by public officers, because the International Monetary Fund has demanded. The regulation was suspended final 12 months after Russia invaded.
The authorities of Mr. Zelensky, who was elected in 2019 on guarantees to curb corruption, has had some success but additionally setbacks, Mr. Borovyk stated.
“During Zelensky we were always one step forward, one step back,” he stated. “In general there were good times and not so good times.”
But he stated leaders are feeling sturdy stress from Ukrainian residents, who’ve ranked the struggle towards corruption as second in significance solely to bringing Russia to justice for the battle.
Oleksandr Chubko and Dyma Shapoval contributed reporting.
Source: www.nytimes.com