More than 40 members of parliament are under investigation or facing charges in cases handled by NABU and SAPO
As of today, 41 members of the Ukrainian parliament are either suspects or defendants in criminal cases being investigated by the National Anti-Corruption Bureau and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office. However, only one lawmaker has publicly stated that this is hindering the work of the Verkhovna Rada.
Oleksandr Klymenko, head of the SAPO, spoke about this in an interview with Deutsche Welle.
“Then his fellow parliamentarians themselves refuted the claim that this prevents them from working, and they demonstrated that parliament is indeed functioning and votes on various laws are taking place,” he noted.
Klymenko added that deputies, even those with suspect status or after a case has been sent to court, may attend parliament and participate in votes.
“Only after a verdict becomes final does the defendant lose their powers as a member of parliament. And no member of the Verkhovna Rada is currently in custody in our criminal proceedings,” explained the head of the SAP.
He also clarified: “There are cases where they were indeed convicted, the verdicts became final, and they lost their powers. Four, I believe, are members of parliament. And several more cases are currently under appeal.”
Klymenko emphasized that “no one is prosecuting them for the vote itself,” explaining that the investigations concern not the fact of participating in the votes, but the possible receipt of funds for them, as well as other offenses, including bribery, illegal enrichment, and failure to declare assets.
Separately, he cited statistics on the agencies’ work.
“We have over 300 convictions, with more than 450 people sentenced to various types of punishment,” Klymenko noted, adding that this includes fines, suspended sentences, and restrictions on liberty.
Klymenko added that there have also been acquittals, which demonstrates the adversarial nature of the judicial process.
He emphasized that these figures cover the entire period of the SAPO’s existence since late 2015.
As a reminder, UA.NEWS recently received a response from the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office to its inquiry regarding the status of the investigation into the case of possible illicit enrichment involving former Deputy Prosecutor General Dmytro Verbytskyi. Spoiler: after two years of investigation, the “cottage and Porsche case” never reached the stage of formal charges, and the case was not referred to court.
