Ukraine’s domestic security service announced on Wednesday the dismissal of two senior officials whose names appeared in an investigation linked to fraudulent call centres.
The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) said its chief, Oleksandr Poklad, had removed the two officials from their positions after they were mentioned in an investigation conducted by the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU).
In a statement posted on Telegram, the SBU said Poklad expected the bureau to conduct a “transparent, objective and impartial” investigation, despite tensions between the two institutions. Their dispute intensified last year after President Volodymyr Zelensky attempted to curtail the anti-corruption agency’s independence.
NABU said one SBU official had “threatened to use a firearm” and prevented investigators from entering locations where they were conducting searches on Wednesday.
According to the bureau, senior officials from the SBU, the prosecutor’s office and the police had paid bribes to law enforcement officers in exchange for turning a blind eye to the activities of fraudulent call centres.
The scams targeted Ukrainians and foreign nationals and involved drug sales, the production of counterfeit cigarettes and the circulation of forged foreign currencies.
NABU also accused a criminal group of at least 12 people of organising “assaults, kidnappings and planned attacks.”
The investigation had previously prompted Ukraine’s Prosecutor General, Ruslan Kravchenko, to resign in September after searches were conducted at offices linked to him. He denied any wrongdoing.
According to the Geneva-based Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, Ukraine’s fraudulent call-centre sector employs around 60,000 people, equivalent to roughly two-thirds of the country’s banking workforce.
The organisation estimates that these activities generate revenue of up to $1 billion per month.
Source: AFP
