00:00Well, let's speak more about this with Daria Kalanuku, who is the executive director at the Anti-Corruption Action Center.
00:08Daria, thank you so much for joining us on the program.
00:12First of all, just want to ask you to explain to us what exactly Ukraine's Anti-Corruption Bureau suspects happened here.
00:19They suspect that there was operating an organized crime group with a key organizer, a businessman who, in parallel, is very close to President Zelensky, and who is co-owner of Quartal 95.
00:38It's the show business of Zelensky before he entered the presidency.
00:44This is what he was managing, this show business.
00:46This guy's name is Timur Mindich.
00:50He also received a notice of suspicion yesterday, as well as officials of power company Energa Atom.
01:00However, this man ran away from Ukraine just hours before Nabu searches his headquarters and the place where he resides.
01:11So, Timur Mindich is the one who is part of the inner circle of President Zelensky, and therefore we believe this investigation is very uncomfortable for the president.
01:24Apart from that, the investigation reveals that Minister of Energy, former Minister of Energy, who is now Minister of Justice, Yerman Halushenko, was engaged in this organized crime group, which siphoned away at least $100 million.
01:42This is what just was documented in 2025 at the contracts of NRHATAM.
01:48These are contracts for repairing nuclear power plants and electricity grid.
01:55And basically, it's not just only officials of the state-owned corporations.
02:02It's just something bigger, the organized crime group covered up by high-level officials.
02:08Well, Daria, let's go back to Mindich, because as you said, he is an associate of Vladimir Zelensky.
02:14You mentioned that he has now reportedly fled the country.
02:17How does his association with Zelensky affect the president's legitimacy now?
02:22I think the president needs to adhere to his promises, which he was given to the people before he ran for the presidency back in 2019.
02:37He wanted to get rid of grand corruption, where usually Ukrainian presidents would make untouchable in a circle of friends who would receive the green light to siphon off the country, to rob the country and to get different kickbacks.
02:57And apparently, it seems to me that his closest friend and business partner is doing exactly what Zelensky was running against.
03:05So now, for Zelensky, it's not enough just to go public and say that we are expecting for the verdicts of the court.
03:12The verdict of the court can take 10 years or years.
03:17It is important that he admits that his business partner, Timur Mindich, ran away from the country, and he suspects it's not acceptable.
03:24He needs to stop covering up his friends and make it as clear as possible to maintain trust of Ukrainian people.
03:32Well, this investigation does come just months after Zelensky rolled back on a controversial bill that would have weakened the powers of NABU, the anti-corruption body.
03:43The draft law triggered massive protests.
03:46How do Ukrainians feel generally about the progress or lack thereof when it comes to fighting corruption in Ukraine?
03:52You know, Ukrainians now are hit with constant electricity stops, and that's basically caused by Russians attacking our electricity grid.
04:07But also a lot of questions are being asked why Ukrainian government didn't properly prepare construction of defense facilities for critical infrastructure, including transformers, which are connecting nuclear power plants to electricity grid.
04:25And these NABU revelations are showing that one of the reasons why it was weak preparedness was corruption, because only those companies, which were paying 10 percent or 50 percent kickbacks to this organized group, were receiving contracts.
04:43So there were delays and there were poor quality of the defensive protection for critical electricity infrastructure.
04:50And that makes people very mad.
04:54People are not accepting that during the wartime.
04:59Such kind of corruption is equal to state treason.
05:02And very straightforward solutions from president are expected.
05:08Well, Daria, maybe I know the answer to this next question.
05:11You're the executive director of an anti-corruption action center there in Ukraine.
05:16How do you feel about the states of the fight against corruption in the country?
05:22Do you think things are getting better?
05:23Are they getting worse?
05:27Important that during the large scale invasion, fight with corruption continues.
05:32Anti-corruption agencies work.
05:35Yes, there was attempt this summer to dismantle the independency of these bodies.
05:40But the people of Ukraine stood up, they protested, they rallied, and the president had to slow down.
05:46However, we're still observing attacks on individual detectives, novel detectives.
05:52One of them is still in jail for a fabricated case, as well as his father.
05:58So we see some tendencies of crackdown on media and watchdog organizations and anti-corruption bodies.
06:07One of the reasons this is happening is because we can't have elections because of the martial law.
06:12And President Zelensky enjoys a lot of power, which is without checks and balances system and without control.
06:19But from time to time, people of Ukraine remind him that the people are the source of power of Ukraine.
06:25And he needs to report to its people.
06:28And people are demanding clear answers to very, very straightforward questions about large scale corruption of inner circle of President Zelensky.
06:37Well, Ukraine arguably has bigger problems on the front line with the war.
06:40How does corruption investigations like this one that's been opened and that controversial draft law that was scrapped, how do they impact morale when it comes to the war?
06:51It is good that there are such investigations.
06:56It's much worse if you are keeping silence and corruption is like cancer, rotting our capacity of being more resilient.
07:04Because in Ukrainian situation where we are fighting Russian aggression, every single hryvnia, every single dollar, every single euro of aid coming from international partners and hryvnia of taxes paid by Ukrainians must be spent effectively and efficiently on what is needed to protect Ukrainians and what is needed to provide soldiers to make sure that they have equipment needed to preserve their lives.
07:32So, corruption is about effectiveness of our governance.
07:36And we are really outraged of having some inner circle inside the President Zelensky who don't care about war, who don't care about defense of Ukrainians, who care only about self-enrichment and having cash, hard cash in bags embezzled from the state and siphoning this cash outside of Ukraine.
07:59This is just absolutely unacceptable.
08:02It very negatively influences our morale of Ukrainian people.
08:07And it sends very, very wrong signal that these facts are happening.
08:14But the good is that we have anti-corruption bodies which are able to unveil that and investigate and prosecute such kind of cases.
08:22It is important that President Zelensky makes up final conclusions and makes them, that he understands that such kind of inner circle of five managers who are managing energy or defense, it's not something that makes Ukraine more resilient.
08:39He can't wait for the indictments and verdicts of the court, which will happen in five or ten years.
08:46He must react now and get rid of government officials who are allegedly engaged in corruption and who are suspect in large-scale corruption.
08:57But we are running out of time, but I do want to get your thoughts on the EU in all of this, the role that it plays, because getting rid of corruption is one of the key requirements for Ukraine to join the bloc.
09:10How is this new investigation likely to affect Ukraine's aspirations of joining the EU?
09:15EU just last week released an important report as part of the EU accession, and it highlights anti-corruption bodies of Ukraine, NABU and SAPO.
09:29And it very clearly explains that it's unacceptable to continue attacks on these institutions.
09:37So it is important that these investigations keep going, that they have their final ending in the courts, and it is important that President Zelensky, through his prosecutor general, who directly reports to him, or through other non-reformed yet agencies, is not interfering into these investigations.
09:58The easiest way for him to now interfere into the investigations is to suspend or dismiss the head of the anti-corruption prosecutor office, Oleksandr Klimenko, who is the one who is signing all of these investigations and is a prosecutor.
10:19He is presenting the interests of the state in these investigations.
10:23So we are following every step of Zolensky and his administration, every step of NABU and SAPO.
10:30We see how intelligence agencies are trying to protect inner circle of Zolensky.
10:36They are basically following every step of every NABU detective.
10:41It seriously undermines their possibilities to investigate top corruption.
10:46And I bet that EU is watching that every step as well.
10:50So if there will be continued attacks and rollbacks, I think the clear reaction of the EU is a must-have, both from the EU but also from partners like France.
11:04It has to be public.
11:05It has to be straightforward.
11:07But important message I want you to leave with.
11:10In Ukraine, absolute majority of Ukrainian people do not tolerate this large-scale corruption, want change, want EU accession, want EU to be strict in good governance and rule of law reforms to Ukraine,
11:24because we believe that it's about our resistance and resilience and effectiveness in our fight with Russia.
11:31Daria, great to get your thoughts on this.
11:33Thank you so much for joining us on Around the World today.
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