Former Energy Minister Svitlana Hrynchuk denied information that she is outside the country.
She stated this in response to a request from BBC News Ukraine.
“Iʼm in Ukraine, at the ministry. I am managing of documents transfer,” she said.
At the same time, Hrynchuk did not explain why she did not appear at the Verkhovna Rada meeting, and did not say whether she received an invitation to consider her resignation. She also did not comment on whether she considers the dismissal fair, how she assesses her own work in the position, and what she thinks about the mention of her name in the Midas case.
The publication sent a similar request to former Justice Minister Herman Halushchenko. Unlike Hrynchuk, he did not respond to the questions and probably did not even receive them.
In WhatsApp and Signal, the messages appear as undelivered to the addressee, which may mean that Halushchenko either turned off his phone or deleted these messengers on it.
He last appeared publicly on November 12, when he announced his suspension as part of the Midas investigation and called it "the right scenario".
Hrynchuk last spoke publicly on November 14, at a parliamentary committee, where she said that due to the "media scandal" she did not consider it possible to remain in office.
She denied any involvement of the “Midas” figures in her appointment and stated that she had an interview only with the Prime Minister. The official also emphasized that she had not visited the office of the organization under investigation by NABU, and that no one had come to her with any job offers.
Political crisis and corruption investigation in the energy sector
On November 10 and 11, NABU released four parts of the wiretap audio recordings and reported a large-scale "Midas" operation to expose corruption in the energy sector.
According to the bureau, “Energoatom” counterparties were forced to pay kickbacks in order to avoid blocking payments for services and products supplied or losing their supplier status. This practice was called "barrier".
According to NABU, members of the organization systematically received 10-15% as a bribe from “Energoatom” counterparties. Using this scheme, they legalized approximately $100 million through an office owned by the family of former MP and current senator of the Russian Federation Andriy Derkach.
Five people were detained in this case, and seven were declared suspects. Their names were later announced by the SAPO prosecutor at court hearings:
- businessman Tymur Mindich, who appeared in NABU records as "Carlson" and is considered the organizer of the scheme;
- former advisor to the Minister of Energy Ihor Myronyuk (“Rocket”);
- Executive Director for Physical Protection and Security of JSC NNEGC “Energoatom” Dmytro Basov (“Tenor”);
- four "employees" of the back office for money laundering: Oleksandr Zukerman ("Sugarman"), Ihor Fursenko ("Ryoshik"), Lesya Ustymenko and Lyudmila Zorina.
Myronyuk, Basov, Zorina, Fursenko, and Ustymenko have already been sent to custody, and Zelensky has imposed sanctions on Mindich and Zukerman. They are involved in the “Energoatom” corruption case. Later, a total of UAH 37 million was paid for Zorina and Ustymenko.
The NABU recordings also show the Minister of Energy, who at the time was Herman Halushchenko. He was searched in the case, and on November 12 he was removed from his post as Minister of Justice.
The SAPO prosecutor claimed that one of the defendants in the case interviewed Svitlana Hrynchuk, who later replaced Halushchenko as Minister of Energy.
Both ministers resigned. On November 19, the Verkhovna Rada voted to dismiss Herman Halushchenko from the post of Minister of Justice of Ukraine and Svitlana Hrynchuk from the post of Minister of Energy. They are included in the NABU investigation into corruption in the energy sector. On the same day, the government appointed Hrynchuk’s first deputy Artem Nekrasov as acting Minister of Energy. Zelensky removed Hrynchuk and Halushchenko from the NSDC.
NABU also claims that the participants in the scheme transferred money to former Deputy Prime Minister Oleksiy Chernyshov, who has already been suspected of illegal enrichment and sent to custody.
President Zelensky and Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko reported an audit of the largest state-owned companies and a large-scale "reset".
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