The Security Service, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau, and the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office have dismantled a criminal group in Kyiv led by a member of the Ukrainian parliament.

According to the investigation, members of this group offered a business representative to organise imposition of sanctions by the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine on a competing company in exchange for USD 250,000.

The MP involved her assistant and several intermediaries in the scheme; one of them was responsible for receiving the bribe.

During negotiations on the amount and terms of the transfer, the parties agreed to divide the payment into two tranches.

To play it safe and guarantee the collection of the entire amount of the illegal benefit, the company representative was instructed to write a receipt for a supposed ‘borrowing of funds’.

The SSU and the NABU documented that the intermediary received the first part of the bribe in the amount of USD 125,000 in Kyiv’s centre.

After that, the ‘client’ was informed that ‘this part would be transferred to NSDC officials’.

However, the funds were never transferred to NSDC or other officials, as the perpetrators did not find a person willing to commit the illegal actions.

During the searches of the offices and homes of the people’s deputy and her accomplices, investigators seized evidence of the crime.

Based on the evidence collected by the SSU, NABU and SAPO, the members of the criminal group were declared suspects under Articles 27.4 and 369.4 of the CCU (incitement to provide an official in a particularly responsible position with an unlawful benefit for the official to act in the interests of the person providing such a benefit, using their official position, committed upon prior conspiracy, by a group).

The decision on measures of restraint for the suspects is pending.