Ukraine seizes nearly UAH 500M worth of assets of Russian oligarch

That's according to the press service of the Prosecutor General's Office, Ukrinform reports.

"These are funds that were held in the accounts of a bank that is one of the ten largest financial institutions and a systemically important bank of Ukraine. The beneficial owners of this banking institution are Russian businessmen," the statement reads.

According to the investigation, the Russian oligarch and businessmen, using controlled Cypriot companies and the aforementioned banking institution, legalized the assets of these companies totaling UAH 1.1 billion before the Russian invasion of Ukraine and during Russia's armed aggression against Ukraine. Later, they withdrew part of the assets from the banking system in Ukraine, and the other was seized.

Thus, the Russian oligarch tried to avoid possible negative consequences in the form of sanctions and measures of forced revocation of property rights provided by the legislation of Ukraine.

According to the report, the pre-trial investigation in the criminal proceedings regarding the legalization (laundering) of property obtained by criminal means, committed by officials of a private banking institution, is carried out by detectives of the Bureau of Economic Security of Ukraine. In order to fulfill the tasks of criminal proceedings, the Prosecutor General's Office organized cooperation with the State Service on Financial Monitoring and the State Tax Service.

Photo: 1news.zp.ua