Anton Shevtsov, ex-police chief of Vinnytsya Oblast, was arrested by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) when trying to cross the border to Russia late on March 17.
Shevtsov was fired as
chief of Vinnytsya Oblast’s police on March 14 after evidence of his
pro-Russian views triggered a high-profile scandal. His dismissal followed
massive protests in Vinnytsya, with activists burning tires near the police
headquarters.
He is now under arrest
and suspected of treason.
Ukrainian media have
published footage that shows Shevtsov
walking with a St. George ribbon, a pro-Russian separatist symbol, in
Russian-occupied Sevastopol during a Victory Day parade on May 9, 2014, shortly
after Russia invaded and annexed the Ukrainian peninsula.
The SBU and National
Police Chief Khatia Dekanoidze have been criticized for failing to properly
check Shevtsov before he was appointed in January.
Earlier this month
Shevtsov posted an SBU document that says the agency had checked him and found
no proof of separatist leanings. SBU spokeswoman Olena Hitlianska did not reply
to a request for comment.
During an interview with
the Kyiv Post, Dekanoidze could not explain why Shevtsov was appointed.
Critics attribute this
appointment to protection from the presidential administration. President Petro
Poroshenko’s spokesman Sviatoslav Tsegolko did not reply to a request for
comment.
“Obviously, someone
lobbied for Anton Shevtsov’s candidacy,” Mustafa Nayyem, a lawmaker from the
Petro Poroshenko Bloc, wrote on Facebook on Feb. 18. “As far as I know, the
initiative came from the presidential administration.”
Several lawmakers and
activists also accused Shevtsov of helping Serhiy Berezenko, a lawmaker from
the Petro Poroshenko Bloc, during the campaign when he won a parliamentary
by-election in Chernihiv last July.
“Under Shevtsov Chernihiv
police was accused of turning into a branch of Berezenko’s campaign
headquarters,” Semen Semenchenko, a lawmaker from the Samopomich party, wrote
on March 18.
Berezenko is closely
allied to Poroshenko and used to be a top official in his administration.
Shevtsov was the chief of police in Chernihiv from July to January, when he was
appointed the chief of police in Vinnytsya, where Poroshenko owns factories and
has a political support base.
Berezenko, as well as his
competitor Gennady Korban, was accused of vote buying during the Chernihiv
election. They deny the accusations.
Radical Party leader Oleh
Lyashko and Svitlana Kryukova, a journalist who was covering the campaign in
Chernihiv, have also claimed that Shevtsov used to be the chief of Berezenko’s
security detail.
Berezenko said on March
18 that Shevtsov had never worked for his campaign headquarters. He praised
Shevtsov’s work as police chief during the election.
He also claimed that he
had not noticed any pro-Russian sentiment on Shevtsov’s part.
Shevtsov was a top police
official in the city of Sevastopol in Crimea during its annexation by Russia in
March 2014.
Journalists
have found photos of Shevtsov with Nikolai Valuyev, a Russian pro-Kremlin
lawmaker, and pictures of his children with Russian military equipment in the
background.
Shevtsov’s
wife Yelena Shevtsova has regularly published pro-Russian posts on social
networks.
Shevtsov
wasn’t the only official in Vinnytsya police who had pro-Russian views.
Alexander
Seliverstov, who served as a deputy chief of Vinnytsya police under Shevtsov,
was the police chief in separatist-controlled Stakhanov in Luhansk Oblast in
2014. Video footage shows Seliverstov saying that he did not want to take down
a Russian flag at his police department, as well as him with a St. George
ribbon at a separatist rally.
It is not
clear if Seliverstov is being investigated by Ukrainian authorities.
Kyiv Post staff writer
Oleg Sukhov can be reached at [email protected].
