Following the publication of a transcript of the July 25 telephone conversation between Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelensky, attention to the Ukrainegate scandal has waned in the Ukrainian media, while the internal U.S. political struggle before the 2020 presidential election is only gaining momentum. As Donald J. Trump’s impeachment process begins, new heroes and new storylines emerge.
In particular, two businessmen were arrested – Igor Fruman and Lev Parnas. In 2018, they arranged a telephone conversation of Trump’s lawyer and an ex-Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin regarding the case against Burisma, the dodgy energy company owned by ex-Ecology Minister Mikhail Zlochevsky. And in 2019, they were present at a meeting of Trump’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, with Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko, during which the case against Burisma was also discussed.
One of the next key figures in Ukrainegate may be the Russian-Ukrainian oligarch Pavlo Fuchs. The majority of Ukrainians, most likely, have not even heard this name, because he rarely gives interviews. He does feature into Panama Papers for his extensive offshore holdings, for buying a portion of the frozen assets of a former President Viktor Yanukovych, and for accusing the Chinese state corporation CNBM of raiding its assets in Ukraine.
Why is Fuchs likely to be at the epicenter of the Ukrainegate scandal?
First, like Fruman and Parnas, Fuchs dealt with Giuliani
The Ukrainian version of Wikipedia has a Fuchs’ picture together with Giuliani in 2017. Moreover, they were not just taking pictures – there were financial relations between them. “I officially hired Giuliani to lobby for Kharkiv’s investment attractiveness in America”, as Fuchs commented this year. And journalists, citing their own sources in diplomatic circles, reported the value of the contract at $400,000.
As Trump’s lawyer is now accused by Democrats for putting pressure on the Ukrainian authorities and considered by them to be the main agent in finding compromising material on Trump’s political rivals, Fuchs’ contacts seem attractive and promising to reveal new information in the investigation.
By the way, Fuchs’ already appears in the official documents of the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Reform, which is the main investigative committee of the U.S. House of Representatives. The committee is requiring that Trump’s lawyer provide all interaction and communication information to a number of individuals, including Fuchs, starting from 2017.
Second, Fuchs has a Russian past, where Trump has shown up
Fuchs returned to Ukraine and received Ukrainian citizenship only recently, in 2015. Prior to that, he had been in Moscow and has had Russian citizenship since the early 1990s. His companies built a large number of real estate in Russia, and he was part of the board of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs. And, according to an investigation by Al Jazeera, Fuchs even received a reward from Vladimir Putin, that he later confirmed in an interview.
What is publicly known is that Fuchs discussed several business projects with Trump in 2006. One of the projects was concerned with the Moscow City Business Center. In order to negotiate with Fuchs in Moscow, Trump even flew with his family, his wife and children. They went to a restaurant, Fuchs showed them Moscow. After that, according to an interview with Fuchs, he last saw Trump in 2009 or 2010 in Miami, where Trump had a big party.
All this fits perfectly into the storyline of Trump’s ties with Russia. And this line has grown quite strongly in the U.S. media space in recent years. Accordingly, this story may take a new breath as Fuchs becomes more aware of Trump’s impeachment process.
Third, Fuchs has real problems with justice
This summer, BTA Bank of Kazakhstan filed a lawsuit to recover $55 million from Fuchs in London. In October this year, the Tagansky court in Moscow arrested Fuchs in absentia on charges of particularly large-scale fraud and announced him on the international wanted list. All this makes Fuchs an extremely convenient target for an information attack on Trump – they say, you see what kind of toxic person the U.S. president is dealing with.
In addition, the Fuchs lawsuits are also a lever of the Kremlin’s influence that makes it possible to intervene in the domestic political situation in the U.S. and further exacerbate scandal. It will be enough, for example, to demand Fuchs extradition from Ukraine to Russia at the right moment. And regardless of whether Ukraine goes to a meeting with Russian justice or refuses to extradite Fuks, it will further involve Ukraine in the scandal and Trump impeachment process.
Thus, after the businessmen Fruman and Parnas, the oligarch Fuchs has a good chance of becoming the next star in an epic called Ukrainegate. And the Ukrainian authorities should be prepared for such a development in the U.S. to reduce the country’s reputational losses and to retain bipartisan support from the U.S. Congress.
Olexiy Minakov is a Ukrainian political commentator and blogger from Kyiv.
