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Ukraine’s top anti-corruption authorities on Monday searched properties linked to senior government officials and a former business partner of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as part of a sweeping investigation into alleged graft in the country’s energy sector.
News of the probe came amid escalating Russian aerial assaults on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure that have led to rolling blackouts and growing anger at Ukrainian authorities for failing to protect power facilities.
The alleged scheme involved “kickbacks” from contractors hired to build fortifications to defend energy infrastructure against Russian missiles and drones. It will add to concerns among Ukraine’s chief partners that the country needs to tackle graft as it seeks billions more dollars in western support for its war effort and economy.
In a statement and 27-minute video laying out its findings, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau (Nabu) said its investigators and officials from the Special Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (Sapo) had conducted a “large-scale operation to expose corruption in the energy sector”.
It followed a 15-month probe that had already gathered some 1,000 hours of audio recordings as evidence. “Today, we are conducting the final phase of this operation, with 70 searches being carried out,” said Oleksandr Abakumov, the head of one of Nabu’s detective units.
A person with knowledge of the probe said that former energy minister and current justice minister German Galushchenko as well as Timur Mindich, a wealthy businessman and co-owner of the Kvartal 95 entertainment company founded with Zelenskyy, were among those under investigation.
The person said Nabu investigators searched properties related to the men and several other suspects early Monday. Ukrainian MP Yaroslav Zheleznyak also confirmed the searches linked to Galushchenko and Mindich in a post on Telegram. He added that he had submitted a proposal to parliament to dismiss Galushchenko.
The controversy was widely reported in Ukrainian media.
Nabu said the “large-scale corruption scheme” attempted to influence public enterprises of strategic importance, including Ukraine’s national nuclear power company Energoatom.
It published photographs of bags stuffed full of US dollars, euros and Ukrainian hryvnia and said that about $100mn had been “laundered” in the scheme.
Nabu and Sapo declined to provide further comment. Mindich and Galushchenko did not respond to a request for comment. Energoatom said in a statement it was “fully co-operating” with the investigation.
Zelenskyy voiced support for the investigation in his evening address, urging government officials to “work together with Nabu and law enforcement agencies”. The president said Energoatom provided Ukraine with the “largest share of its energy generation”, making the good standing of the company a “priority”. He added: “There must be sentences.”
The allegations triggered an immediate political reaction in Ukraine, where Russia’s renewed attacks on energy infrastructure have put the spotlight on Ukraine’s defences around power plants and substations.
“I’m extremely saddened to see the extent of corruption in the energy sector,” said Inna Sovsun, a Ukrainian opposition lawmaker and member of the parliamentary committee on energy issues. But she added: “I’m not surprised.”
Nabu said that some of the kickbacks involved contracts for the construction of protective structures for the Khmelnytskyi nuclear power plant.
Ukraine’s top diplomat Andriy Sybiha said on Saturday that Russian forces had targeted substations powering two nuclear power plants in western Ukraine during a major missile and drone attack the previous night. The director of the International Atomic Energy Agency confirmed that an attack “critical for nuclear safety and security” forced the two power plants to reduce their output.
The fate of the Nabu and Sapo, seen as one of the key achievements of the reform movement following 2014’s Euromaidan revolution, became the catalyst for rare wartime protests in July after Ukraine’s parliament attempted to put the agency under control of the office of the prosecutor-general, who had been handpicked by Zelenskyy weeks before.
The move triggered the biggest demonstrations in Ukraine since the start of Russia’s war, breaking a taboo on wartime criticism of the president and prompting Zelenskyy to backtrack.