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The National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine, or NABU, on April 4 released audio recordings implicating Chief Anti-Corruption Prosecutor Nazar Kholodnytsky in alleged corruption.
The Kyiv Post has also obtained a copy of a document on Kholodnytsky’s alleged wrongdoings drafted by the NABU and sent to the Qualification and Disciplinary Commission of Prosecutors.
Kholodnytsky said on April 3 he would initiate his own suspension from his job during the investigation against him.
He also said in Ukraine’s parliament, the Verkhovna Rada, on April 4 that he’s ready for any discrediting campaigns against him.
Responding to reformist lawmaker Sergii Leshchenko’s accusations, Kholodnytsky lashed out at him. Kholodnytsky said that he had registered a criminal case into Leshchenko’s purchase of a $281,000 apartment in Kyiv.
In 2016 prosecutors opened an unlawful enrichment case into the purchase of the apartment but later closed it due to the absence of a crime. In 2017 a court also rejected the National Agency for Preventing Corruption’s attempt to fine Leshchenko, finding him not guilty of violating the anti-corruption law by purchasing the apartment.
Kholodnytsky has complete control over rank-and-file anti-corruption prosecutors and does not allow them to sign notices of suspicion for suspects in violation of the law, according to the document sent to the Qualification and Disciplinary Commission of Prosecutors. He requires all notices of suspicion to be stamped with his personal seal as a form of illegal control over his subordinates, the document read.
Under the law, anti-corruption prosecutors must approve notices of suspicion independently.
In the recordings, Kholodnytsky is heard pressuring anti-corruption prosecutors to make certain decisions, urging a witness to give false testimony, and tipping off suspects that their properties were about to be searched. In the five recordings compiled and published by the NABU, Kholodnytsky swears a lot and sometimes switches topics while answering his employees’ questions.
Korchak
In one of the recordings, Kholodnytsky talks to a prosecutor about Natalya Korchak, an incumbent top official of the NAPC, and the agency’s ex-chief.
Korchak is under investigation for failing to declare a Skoda Octavia A7 car, as well as in a case into alleged large-scale corruption exposed by NAPC whistleblowers Hanna Solomatina and Oksana Divnich in November.
When a prosecutor mentions that NABU detectives would need temporary access to Korchak’s documents and her belongings, Kholodnytsky abruptly says: “What the hell? Didn’t they have other cases (to work on), so now they’re playing with the Korchak (case)?”
Conversations in Chief Anti-Corruption Prosecutor Nazar Kholodnytsky’s office recorded by the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine.
When the prosecutor ensures him that enough information has been collected by the NABU to open a criminal case against Korchak, Kholodnytsky switches to a different topic.
On Feb. 16, Kholodnytsky told Yaroslav Yurchyshyn, head of Transparency International Ukraine, that he would not prosecute Korchak.
Suprun case
Another case discussed by Kholodnytsky is the one against Oleksandr Bohachyov, an aide to Radical Party lawmaker Oleh Lyashko. According to the investigators, Bohachyov in collusion with Ilya Dikov, mayor of the city of Vishneve in Kyiv Oblast, have offered an apartment as a bribe to Health Minister Ulana Suprun in exchange for equipment in the Vishneve city hospital.
The case was opened at Suprun’s request.
On March 1, Kholodnytsky warned Serhiy Kaftya, another suspect in the Suprun case, about searches, discussed the details of the case and urged him to give false testimony during an interrogation. Kholodnytsky also told Roman Symkiv, an anti-corruption prosecutor, that Kaftya is a friend of his.
Kholodnytsky also ordered his deputy Volodymyr Kryvenko to intimidate Dikov, according to the document drafted by the NABU.
Later Kholodnytsky ordered Symkiv to punish NABU detectives in the Suprun case by refusing to authorize their documents.
Kholodnytsky also ordered his deputy Kryvenko to call the head of the Solomyansky Court not to consider the search motions in the Suprun case.
Subsequently Soloymansky Court Judge Anna Serhiyenko told NABU detective Krykun-Trush that she cannot authorize the search motions because Kryvenko had told her not to issue a search warrant due to an alleged mistake.
Anti-corruption prosecutor Ihor Harvanko arrived at the Soloymansky Court and told Krykun-Trush that Kholodnytsky had not authorized the searches and told Serhiyenko not to authorize the motion due to an alleged mistake. He did not explain what the mistake was.
However, the court partially authorized the search warrants.
Lohvynsky
On Feb. 9, Kholodnytsky also told People’s Front lawmaker Georgy Lohvynsky that he had his criminal cases under control and would warn him about investigative actions that would be taken against him.
Lohvynsky is under investigation for allegedly embezzling Hr 40 million at a firm called Belvedere Ukraina and Hr 18 million at Bank Stolytsya.
Meanwhile, Deputy Justice Minister Natalia Bernatska and Borys Babin, the Ukrainian government’s former representative at the European Court of Human Rights, are investigated over allegedly abusing their power by promoting Lohvynsky’s interests in the implementation of the European Court of Human Rights’ ruling in the case called “Zoloty Mandarin Oil vs Ukraine.”
Serhiy Kozachyna, an anti-corruption prosecutor in charge of the Lohvynsky cases, told Kholodnytsky that he wanted to sign a notice of suspicion for Lohvynsky.
But Kholodnytsky told Kozachyna there is a political motive and that he did not want to quarrel with Lohvynsky’s allies – Poroshenko Bloc lawmaker Mustafa Dzhemilev, Poroshenko Bloc lawmaker Refat Chubarov, Lohvynsky’s wife Hanna Yudkivska, a judge of the European Court of Human Rights, and other judges of the European Court of Human Rights.
Bakhmatyuk
Kholodnytsky also ordered his deputy Kravchenko to transfer several embezzlement cases against agribusiness tycoon Bakhmatyuk to another law enforcement body.
He also told Kravchenko that anti-corruption prosecutors should stop the investigations against Bakhmatyuk. On March 7, Kholodnytsky transferred the Bakhmatyuk cases to the National Police despite his subordinates’ wishes.
Trukhanov
Other cases that led to the investigation into Kholodnytsky’s work include an embezzlement case against Odesa city officials. The main suspect in it is Odesa Mayor Hennady Trukhanov.
On Feb. 7, Kholodnytsky told his deputy Kryvenko not to carry out investigative actions and not to prosecute Trukhanov.
Background
While addressing parliament, Kholodnytsky said the “the wiretapped recordings are out of context.”
“And as for the swear words, I’m sorry, I can’t fight against corruption in white gloves, I’m a common man,” he said. “I know that many people want these positions (the chief anti-corruption prosecutor and the NABU head) to be vacant again, but we have started our fight against corruption and it will keep going on.”
Last year the Prosecutor General’s Office and the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine started investigating a criminal case against Kholodnytsky.
On March 30, Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko said that he had asked the Qualification and Disciplinary Commission of Prosecutors to fire Kholodnytsky.
NABU Chief Artem Sytnyk told the Dzerkalo Tyzhnya newspaper in a March 30 interview he had asked the Prosecutor General’s Office to approve a notice of suspicion for Kholodnytsky.
In turn, Kholodnytsky said that the accusations against him were unfounded and that if he were fired, Lutsenko would effectively gain direct control over the NABU.
According to Volodymyr Petrakovsyi, a law enforcement expert at the Reanimation Package of Reforms, if Kholodnytsky is dismissed, Lutsenko will be able to block NABU cases by selecting loyal anti-corruption prosecutors and refusing to authorize searches for judges and lawyers.
Kholodnytsky himself has been repeatedly accused of blocking corruption cases in the interests of President Petro Poroshenko and his inner circle, which he denies.
Reporting in parliament about the results of their work, Sytnyk stressed that there’s “no conflict” between the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office and the NABU.
“NABU detectives and the prosecutors of the anti-corruption prosecutor’s office are working as usual,” he added.
When Kholodnytsky was the first deputy chief prosecutor of Crimea in 2014 to 2015, prosecutors of the Crimea prosecutor’s office were arrested and investigated over allegedly extorting a bribe for releasing a suspect. A source who was not authorized to speak to he press said that Kholodnytsky was implicated in the case.
The Kyiv-based Crimea prosecutor’s office investigates crimes linked to Russian-annexed Crimea.
