President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyi dismissed Ilya Vityuk from the post of head of the Department of Counterintelligence Protection of State Interests in Information Security of the Security Service of Ukraine.
The relevant decree No. 257/2024 is published on the website of the Office of the President.
The dismissal occurred after "Slidstva.Info" journalist Yevhenii Shulgat published an investigation on April 4 about the fact that Vityukʼs wife bought an apartment in the capitalʼs premium residential complex in December 2023. The officialʼs declaration states that 12.8 million hryvnias were paid for the apartment, although its market value exceeds 20 million.
"Slidstvo.Info" stated that Vityukʼs official income would not be enough for this apartment. At the same time, his wife Yulia started doing business shortly after her husband was appointed to this position. The SBU assured that her earnings are enough for the purchased real estate.
After that, the Agency for Journalistic Investigations stated that representatives of the Military Commissariat tried to serve a subpoena to their journalist Shulgat on the instructions of a SBU employee. In this way, the special services allegedly wanted to "punish" the investigator.
The press service of the SBU said that they are verifying this information together with the Ministry of Defense and the General Staff of the Armed Forces. The Prosecutor Generalʼs Office opened a criminal investigation into the incident. The command of the Ground Forces said that they are conducting an official inspection to establish all the circumstances of the event. The Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces Oleksandr Syrsky also ordered the official inspection to be carried out.
On April 9, the head of the SBU, Vasyl Malyuk, removed Vityuk from his duties after the investigation by the journalists of Slidstva. Info".
On April 19, the journalists of "Investigations. Info" published another investigation, in which they claimed that on February 20, 2014, Vytyuk filmed how fighters of the Berkut special police unit shot protesters on the Maidan in Kyiv during the Revolution of Dignity.