Ukraine tycoon who backed Zelensky’s presidential bid accused of fraud
An influential Ukrainian mogul who backed Volodymyr Zelensky’s 2019 presidential bid was named as a suspect in a fraud and money laundering probe amid a countrywide crackdown on corruption.
Igor Kolomoisky, an energy, media and banking tycoon, was given a “notice of suspicion” in the criminal case, the Security Service of Ukrainian said in a statement Saturday.
“It was established that between 2013 and 2020, Kolomoisky legalized more than half a billion Ukrainian hryvnia [around $13.5 million] by moving it abroad using the infrastructure of controlled banking institutions,” the agency’s press service said.
Kolomoisky is the co-founder of PrivatBank, Ukraine’s biggest financial institution, which was taken into state ownership in 2016 after officials discovered $5 billion in missing assets from the company.
The Ukrainian-born oligarch also controlled a large media empire that promoted Zelensky during his 2019 run for president and “many viewed Zelensky as Kolomoisky’s candidate,” the US think tank the Atlantic Council said in 2021.
The criminal case targeting Kolomoisky is the latest in an ongoing crackdown on graft that saw Zelensky fire all of his military recruitment chiefs for corruption last month.
