(Bloomberg) — A Ukrainian deputy prime minister said he’s cooperating with authorities after the nation’s anti-graft watchdogs announced that a senior official is a suspect in a corruption investigation.
Oleksiy Chernyshov, who denied any wrongdoing, said he had a “constructive” exchange with investigators from the National Anti-Corruption Bureau, or NABU, on Monday for more than two hours, according to a Facebook post. He’s prepared for “full cooperation” and is reviewing related documents, Chernyshov said.
The deputy premier would be the highest-level official in President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s government to be part of a corruption probe. NABU and the Special Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office earlier issued a so-called notice of suspicion against an unnamed deputy prime minister who previously served as the country’s minister for communities, the bureau said in a statement on its website.
Chernyshov, who returned to Ukraine on Sunday from a weeklong trip to meet European officials, matched the description. The probe concerns an alleged scheme to obtain land well below market prices in order to build a residential complex, NABU said. Those who facilitated it received discounted apartments, the agency said.
NABU said the minister received an “unlawful benefit” through a purchase discounted by more than 14.5 million hryvnia ($346,000). The broader scheme may have cost the state more than 1 billion hryvnia in losses, prosecutors said earlier. Prosecutors have launched criminal cases against other state officials and developers over the deal.
Following his stint in the development ministry, Chernyshov was appointed chief executive officer of Ukraine’s largest state-run energy company, Naftogaz, in 2022. Last year he returned to the cabinet — and is currently responsible for policy aimed at bringing Ukrainian refugees back home.
He also lobbied for a recent law change enabling Ukrainians to hold multiple citizenships.
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