Evidence has emerged that Oleksandr Hranovsky, an influential lawmaker from the Bloc of President Petro Poroshenko, may have intervened in the work of judges and prosecutors, according to a Radio Liberty investigation released on May 19.
Sergii Leshchenko, another lawmaker from the Poroshenko Bloc, has repeatedly accused Hranovsky of informally supervising the prosecutorial and judicial system on behalf of Poroshenko and his right-hand man, Ihor Kononenko.
Hranovsky, who is widely seen as a Kononenko protégé, is in charge of the anti-corruption department at the Prosecutor General’s Office, which has been accused of routinely fabricating political cases, according to Leshchenko.
Hranovsky denied having any influence over courts and prosecutors in an interview with Radio Liberty.
Meeting important people
Radio Liberty filmed Hranovsky meeting with several influential people in the Ink restaurant at the Leonardo office building in Kyiv.
They included ex-Fuel and Energy Minister Volodymyr Demchyshyn; Oleksandr Ruvin, the head of the Kyiv Institute for Forensic Research; Pavlo Vovk, the chairman of Kyiv’s Administrative District Court; and businessman Serhiy Tyshchenko.
The Security Service of Ukraine has opened a case into an alleged oil product embezzlement scheme linked to Tyshchenko and lawmaker Serhiy Pashynsky, according to an investigation by news website Ukrainska Pravda published last year. Tyshchenko and Pashynsky have denied the accusations.
Hranovsky said he was friends with Demchyshyn, while Ruvin had met with him to introduce him to his son, and Tyshchenko had just accidentally come across him in the restaurant.
He described Vovk as “one of the strongest judges” who often visits the Verkhovna Rada’s legal policy committee, and said his meeting with him was about the fate of certain judges whose powers have expired.
Lysenko saga
Hranovsky’s meeting with Vovk was filmed after investigative journalist Dmytro Gnap took a picture of Hranovsky drinking tea with controversial prosecutor Serhiy Lysenko earlier in May.
The meetings triggered speculation that Hranovsky could have something to do with Lysenko’s reinstatement as a prosecutor by the Administrative District Court in April.
Lysenko was fired last June after a journalist published photos of his exchange of smartphone messages with two other prosecutors, Artem Tenditny and Denys Solovyev, in a courtroom.
“This a**hole is always taking pictures of me — we could open a criminal case against him,” Tenditny wrote, referring to the defendant.
Lysenko replied: “Why? Let’s just beat the sh*t out of him. Or let’s have someone steal his phone in our neighborhood.”
This did not prevent Hranovsky from describing Lysenko as “an experienced, talented and strong prosecutor whose services I use sometimes.”
“He knows very well the materials I’m interested in,” Hranovsky added.
Sky Mall scandal
Lysenko has been accused of helping Hranovsky and his business partner Andriy Adamovsky in a corporate conflict around the Sky Mall shopping center in Kyiv. He was one of the prosecutors in charge of criminal cases against Arricano Real Estate, a company owned by Hranovsky’s opponent – Estonian businessman Hillar Teder.
Hranovsky and Adamovsky have been accused of illegally seizing Sky Mall from Teder. Earlier in May, a London court ruled in favor of Teder, ordering the mall to be transferred to Arricano Real Estate. Hranovsky and Adamovsky deny the accusations.
According to British Virgin Islands records of court hearings on the alleged seizure of Sky Mall, Hranovsky has admitted getting $700,000 in cash from his partners. He did not include the money in his declaration.
Hranovsky accused the Radio Liberty journalists of espionage, while his bodyguards from the Security Service of Ukraine tried to prevent them from filming and threatened them with criminal cases. Hranovsky also said on May 17 that he would seek to ban the publication of the video footage through a court.
After Radio Liberty cameraman Yaroslav Bondarenko showed his documents to Hranovsky’s bodyguards, his personal data was leaked and published by several Ukrainian media outlets.
Odesa link
Another scandal linked to Hranovsky’s alleged influence over the judicial system concerns the Odesa Portside Plant.
Nashi Hroshi, an anti-corruption watchdog, reported on May 19 that a court had banned the National Anti-Corruption Bureau from accessing Viber messages written by Olga Tkachenko, a member of the plant’s executive board.
Tkachenko used to be an aide to Hranovsky and chief executive of Hranovsky’s Sky Mall shopping center.
“Petro Poroshenko is blocking the National Anti-Corruption Bureau’s investigation into the Odesa Portside Plant and saving his dear friends,” Vitaly Shabunin, head of the Anti-Corruption Action Center’s executive board, wrote on Facebook on May 19.
The bureau is investigating an alleged corruption scheme at the plant. According to the investigators, Austrian company Antra was supplying natural gas to the plant in exchange for ammonia and other fertilizers at above-market prices, which deprives the state-owned Odesa Portside Plant of revenues.
Both Hranovsky and Kononenko have been accused of involvement in the scheme, which they deny.
Other connections
Hranovsky has also admitted being acquainted with Oleh Valendyuk, acting chief prosecutor of Kyiv.
Leshchenko told the Kyiv Post that a court ruling preventing Valendyuk from being fired under the lustration law had likely been made with Poroshenko’s blessing. The lustration law envisages dismissing top officials who served under ex-President Viktor Yanukovych.
Meanwhile, Pavlo Dykan, a lawyer for slain EuroMaidan Revolution protesters, told the Kyiv Post that Hranovsky had been attending meetings of top officials at the Prosecutor General’s Office.
Kyiv Post staff writer Oleg Sukhov can be reached at [email protected]
