HOT ANTICORRUPTION NEWS / Issue #78
November 3, 2018

Today's issue:
 

- former MP Mykola Martynenko, indicted by NABU of corruption, demands AntAC to remove public references regarding his corruption cases;
- the court of appeal also rejected lawsuit of SBU first deputy head Demchyna against Shabunin;
- a year ago, on October 31, 2017 NABU detained Avakov's son;
- Transparency International: Instigators of attacks against activists in Ukraine must face justice
 

Former MP Mykola Martynenko, indicted by NABU of corruption, demands AntAC to remove public reference regarding his corruption cases

Former MP from the Narodnyi Front party Mykola Martynenko, indicted by NABU of money laundering, filed the lawsuit against AntAC. He demands to remove references regarding his participation in corrupt activities from the Public Register of Domestic Politically Exposed Persons of Ukraine pep.org.ua, which is held by the NGO.

The database helps banks to identify politically exposed persons among their clients. It has over 30,000 documented records in Ukrainian and English about Ukrainian politicians, prosecutors, judges, law-enforcement officers and their relatives. 

In his lawsuit Martynenko accuses AntAC of allegedly illegally using his name in description of criminal offenses and corruption cases where his guilt or participation is not established by the court.

AntAC lawyers explain that Martynenko does not have grounds to be offended to his own dossier, published in the Public Register of Domestic PEPs. Collected information is either confirmed by documents, namely by court decisions or excerpts from the state registers, or is already known to public from numerous journalists’ investigations and his own comments. Moreover, case against him is already being heard in the court. More details. 

Martynenko and his accomplices are charged of embezzling 6,4 million EUR of SE NNEGC Energoatom and 17,29 million USD of state enterprise Eastern Mining and Processing Plant. For more details about the schemes, please see infographics below (also in high resolution here and here). 

On October 29, the first hearing regarding Martynenko’s appeal against AntAC took place. During one hearing, judge V.V. Bortnytska managed to hear legal demands of attorneys, AntAC’s objections and evidence of both parties and announced the break. The next hearing is scheduled for 16.30 on December 10. It will begin with parties’ debates. AntAC lawyers think the speed of consideration of the lawsuit is blazing. More details. 

The court of appeal also rejected lawsuit of SBU first deputy head Pavlo Demchyna against
Vitaliy Shabunin

The court of appeal rejected lawsuit of Pavlo Demchyna, First Deputy Head of the Security Service of Ukraine and the head of SBU anticorruption department, against Vitaliy Shabunin, AntAC Head of Board. 

Pavlo Demchyna asked the court to declare the information from Vitaliy Shabunin’s post on Facebook untrue and such that degrades his honor, dignity and business reputation, as well as to refute it. Vitaliy described lifestyle and work of Demchyna based on information disclosed in journalistic investigation of Slidstvo.Info project.

First instance court rejected Demchyna's lawsuit against Shabunin in July. Background information. 

A year ago, on October 31, 2017 NABU detained Avakov's son

Short reminder about how the case against Avakov's son was completely dumped by the SAPO. 

Ukraine’s anticorruption fight hits a brick wall, and the wall has a name. 

Transparency International: Instigators of attacks against activists in Ukraine must face justice

Transparency International urges authorities in Ukraine to act quickly to ensure that all those behind recent attacks against civil society activists are brought to justice. Full text of the statement.