Ukrainian Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor Nazar Kholodnytsky, who faced accusations of divulging secrets about corruption cases, has resigned after five years on the job.
Many officials, diplomats and anti-corruption activists had long wanted Kholodnytsky out. His five-year term was scheduled to expire on Nov. 30, but he chose to leave three months earlier.
“I made this decision myself. Putting pressure on me is useless,” he told the Kyiv Post in a message explaining the reasons why he quit the job.
“My term expires in autumn. I am not (Alexander) Lukashenko and am not holding onto the post,” he added, referring to the Belarusian dictator whose fraudulent reelection sparked protests across Belarus.
Kholodnytsky’s exit comes after a public fight between the controversial prosecutor and Iryna Venediktova, the prosecutor general. In May, she criticized him in a video and launched an internal inspection of his work.
Kholodnytsky declined to comment on whether he was forced to leave.
“It was his voluntary resignation, so there is nothing to comment on,” a spokesperson for the Prosecutor General’s Office told the Kyiv Post in a phone conversation.
Long history of accusations
Kholodnytsky has long faced accusations of using his power to sabotage the work of anti-corruption law enforcement in the country, something he has always denied.
During an investigation that began in 2017, the Prosecutor General’s Office and the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) bugged an aquarium in his office and recorded his conversations. The recordings appeared to show Kholodnytsky blocking or subverting corruption cases against powerful suspects.
“For what he did, he has to be jailed, not just removed,” said Vitaliy Shabunin, head of the Anti-Corruption Action Center (ANTAC) nonprofit.
Venediktova’s predecessors, including Ruslan Riaboshapka and Yuriy Lutsenko, also criticized Kholodnytsky and wanted him out.
In 2018, Lutsenko and Artem Sytnyk, the acting head of NABU, filed a request to fire Kholodnytsky to the Qualification and Disciplinary Commission of Prosecutors.
The commission found Kholodnytsky responsible for a number of wrongdoings and reprimanded him. In its report, it listed tipping off suspects about searches, pressuring prosecutors and judges to stop cases against high-profile suspects and swearing among his misdeeds.
The Prosecutor General’s Office then launched a criminal investigation into Kholodnytsky, but soon closed it after finding that he had not violated the law.
In March 2019, following the scandal surrounding Kholodnytsky, then-U.S. Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch called on the Ukrainian authorities to fire him.
What’s next for Kholodnytsky?
On Aug. 21, Kholodnytsky announced his resignation on his Facebook page by posting an employment termination order signed by Venediktova.
He also wrote an almost 2,000-word reflection on his work as chief anti-corruption prosecutor.
In the post, Kholodnytsky said that collaboration with the Prosecutor General’s Office was always a challenge for his office, which was doing its best to be independent. In contrast, the Prosecutor General’s Office wanted to receive patronage, he alleged.
He also said that his institution managed to document Hr 200 billion ($7.3 billion) in damages in criminal cases.
According to Kholodnytsky, the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office pressed charges against 15 members of parliament, 22 top officials, 47 judges, 68 directors of state enterprises and 17 senior officials of state bodies during his time in office.
Kholodnytsky gave no indication of his future plans. Asked about rumors that he was appointed President Volodymyr Zelensky’s adviser on fighting corruption, Kholodnytsky declined to comment.
Successor?
A new specialized anti-corruption prosecutor must be selected on a competitive basis.
First, however, members of the selection commission have to be appointed. The commission will consist of 11 people, including seven delegates selected by parliament and four delegates from the Council of Prosecutors.
The Council of Prosecutors has already decided on its delegates. Now parliament must decide.
But the parliament’s candidates do not look trustworthy, according to ANTAC.
“Our main task is to ensure that the seven members of the commission appointed by parliament…are decent people with perfect reputations,” Shabunin said.
In early September, the Ukrainian parliament is expected to vote for its representatives to the commission.
If the contest to replace Kholodnytsky is held without transparency, then the end result will be negative, Shabunin said.
“Zelensky and his faction want to appoint an even worse prosecutor [than Kholodnytsky],” he told the Kyiv Post.
But there is still a hope, he said, that the new specialized anti-corruption prosecutor will be appointed transparently and independent prosecutors will have better opportunities to do their jobs.
Before that happens, the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office will be led by Maksym Gryshchuk, its deputy chief, the RBK-Ukraine news outlet reported, citing anonymous sources in the agency.
According to the UNIAN news agency, Gryshchuk said that he had learned about his new position from his colleagues. “This news came unexpectedly,” he said.
He also said that he was on vacation when the news broke and that his vacation is now over, UNIAN reported.
Gryshchuk previously worked as a prosecutor in Lviv, a city some 500 kilometers west of Kyiv. He is a veteran of the war in Donbas and defended the Donetsk airport during the drawn-out, brutal battle there in 2014-2015.
