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Viktor Shokin says Hunter Biden was recruited by Burisma to
‘provide protection’ while company engaged in ‘illegal activities’
By Patrick Reilly, NYPost
August 26, 2023 9:04pm Updated
Fired Ukraine prosecutor general Viktor Shokin claims he was fired by the former Ukrainian president at Joe Biden's insistence.
Fired Ukraine prosecutor general Viktor Shokin claimed then-second son Hunter Biden was brought on to the Ukrainian gas company Burisma’s board in order to “provide protection” for CEO and founder Mykola Zlochevsky from criminal investigations.
“I have no doubt that there were illegal activities engaged in by Burisma,” he told Fox News’ “One Nation” host Brian Kilmeade through a translator in an interview that aired on Saturday night.
“It continued to expand and Zlochevsky, who at the time held the post of minister … started bringing in people who could provide protection for him. Hunter Biden was among them and the corruption network expanded as a result,” he said.
Kyiv’s former top prosecutor has emerged as a key figure in the investigation into the Biden family foreign business dealings and accusations of bribery. Shokin’s accusations, if deemed credible, could add fire to calls for a House impeachment inquiry into the president — which could happen as soon as next month.
Shokin claims he was forced out of office in 2016 by former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko “at the insistence of then-Vice President Joe Biden” amid an investigation into Burisma Holdings and Zlochevsky, Shokin told Kilmeade.
Biden was withholding much-needed aid to Ukraine in exchange for bribes for Shokin’s removal, Shokin believes.
“I do not want to deal in unproven facts, but my firm personal conviction is that, yes, this was the case. They were being bribed. And the fact that Joe Biden gave away $1 billion in U.S. money in exchange for my dismissal, my firing, isn’t that alone a case of corruption?” he questioned.
Biden publicly claimed credit for forcing out Shokin by threatening to withhold $1 billion in US loan guarantees.
Hunter Biden was on Burisma’s payroll for up to $1 million per year as a member of the company’s board beginning in April 2014.
Shokin was fired in 2016 by former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko after he claims Biden forced him out.
NurPhoto via Getty Images
Shokin said he has “no doubts” that the since-disbanded company was engaged in illegal activity.
He said the probe into Burisma was “an ordinary case” with nothing particularly remarkable about it but it demanded “special attention” given the Bidens’ connection.
“It was on a list of cases to merit special attention because Hunter Biden was involved with Burisma and of course, his father, the vice president. Biden at the time oversaw Ukraine affairs for the White House,” he said.
Shokin says Biden’s business interests led to the “full scale war” between Ukraine and Russia.
An FBI informant file made public last month revealed that Zlochevsky claimed in 2016 that he was “coerced” into paying a $10 million bribe to the president and his son in exchange for Shokin’s ouster.
Purported internal Obama-Biden administration emails from 2016 published by Just the News this week showed that officials were shocked that Biden was pushing for Shokin’s ouster as a condition of US aid.
Hunter Biden’s former business partner Devon Archer, who also joined Burisma’s board in 2014, told the House Oversight Committee last month that Burisma added Hunter to its board so that “people would be intimidated to mess with them … legally.”
Archer confirmed that Joe Biden met with Burisma board advisor Vadym Pozharskyi in Washington in 2015, and spoke to Hunter on the phone with Pozharskyi and Zlochevsky present at a 2015 meeting in Dubai.
Shokin says he was fired because his office “would have found the facts about the corrupt activities that they were engaging in. That included both Hunter Biden and Devon Archer and others.”
Joe Biden spoke on the phone four times in February and March 2016 with then-Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and once with Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk as he pushed for Shokin’s ouster.
Shokin’s office won a court order to seize Zlochevsky’s property on Feb. 2, 2016, the Kyiv Post reported at the time. Shokin was fired on March 29.
It reads like a very high version of the old Mafia protection rackets. Should we start calling Joe - Godfather?
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Another corruption story from the land of corruption...
2 Ukrainian officials misappropriated $1.6 million,
anti-corruption agency says
By Patrick Hilsman
Two Ukrainian officials have been implicated in a corruption scandal involving food supplies as part of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's anti-corruption push.
The officials misappropriated about $1.6 million in funds,
according to Ukraine's anti-corruption agency.
File Photo by Ukrainian President Press Office/UPI | License Photo
Aug. 25 (UPI) -- Two high-ranking Ukrainian officials have been embroiled in a corruption scandal as the government of President Volodymyr Zelensky continues its anti-corruption push.
First Deputy Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food Taras Vysotskyi, and an unnamed former deputy minister of the economy were found to have misused about $1.68 million in funds.
Vysotskyi took advantage of the Ukrainian railway company Ukrzalinznytsia for one of the schemes, anti-corruption officials said.
"From March to August 2022, Ukrzaliznytsia overpaid companies participating in the scheme UAH 22.7 million [$610,000]. Having been received, the funds were transferred to a foreign company with signs of fictitiousness for further legalization," the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine said in a press release Friday.
"Draft records outlining the distribution of the ill-gotten gains were discovered during a search at a scheme participant's place," NABU said.
NABU said "he was aware of the actual market value of the products, as he regularly received relevant data from the state statistical service."
Earlier this month, Zelensky fired all regional military recruitment heads after an officer, Yevhen Borisov, was found to have up to $5 million in assets hidden in his mother's name in Spain. The Ukrainian president said the recruitment officers would be replaced by wounded military veterans.
"Corruption in military recruiting will be eliminated. The heads of all regional recruitment centers will be fired and replaced by brave warriors who have lost their health on the frontlines but maintained their dignity," Zelensky tweeted.
In January, Deputy Defense Minister Vyacheslav Shapovalov resigned his post after a Ukrainian publication revealed he had purchased food for the military at inflated prices. Defense officials claimed the purchases occurred at inflated prices due to a "technical mistake."
Right! The only technical mistake was that he got caught.
Several other officials resigned after coming under scrutiny and President Zelensky responded by barring officials from unauthorized travel abroad.
"It applies to law enforcers, people's deputies, prosecutors and all those who are supposed to work for the state," the Ukrainian president said.
Russia says genetic tests confirm Wagner leader Prigozhin died in plane crash
Crash came 2 months after mercenary leader led mutiny against Russia's military
Thomson Reuters · Posted: Aug 27, 2023 6:20 AM PDT | Last Updated: August 27
Yevgeny Prigozhin, chief of Russian private mercenary group Wagner, gives an address in a desert area at an unknown location, believed to be in Africa, in an image taken from a video published Aug. 21. Russian officials say they have confirmed Prigozhin was killed in a plane crash on Wednesday. (Reuters)
Russian investigators said on Sunday that genetic tests had confirmed that Yevgeny Prigozhin, chief of the Wagner mercenary group who led a short-lived armed rebellion against Russia's military, was among the 10 people killed in a plane crash last week.
Russia's aviation agency had previously published the names of all 10 people on board the private jet that crashed in the Tver region northwest of Moscow on Wednesday. They included Prigozhin, Dmitry Utkin, his right-hand man who helped found the Wagner group, and Wagner logistics mastermind Valery Chekalov.
"As part of the investigation of the plane crash in the Tver region, molecular-genetic examinations have been completed," Russia's Investigative Committee said in a statement on the Telegram messaging app.
"According to their results, the identities of all 10 dead were established. They correspond to the list stated in the flight sheet," it said.
Authorities have yet to say what they believe caused his private jet to fall from the sky.
Russian servicemen inspect a part of a crashed private jet near the village of Kuzhenkino, Tver region, Russia,
on Thursday. (Alexander Zemlianichenko/The Associated Press)
Putin called mutiny 'stab in the back'
The crash came two months to the day after Prigozhin, 62, and his Wagner mercenaries staged a mutiny against Russian military commanders in which they took control of a southern city, Rostov-on-Don, and advanced toward Moscow before turning around 200 kilometres from the capital.
Russian President Vladimir Putin described the June 23-24 mutiny as a treacherous "stab in the back," but later met with Prigozhin in the Kremlin.
He sent his condolences on Thursday to the families of those believed to have died in the crash.
A member of private mercenary group Wagner pays tribute to Prigozhin and Dmitry Utkin, who managed Wagner's operations, at a makeshift memorial in Rostov-on-Don, Russia, on Thursday. (AFP/Getty Images)
Western politicians and commentators have suggested, without presenting evidence, that Putin ordered Prigozhin to be killed as punishment for the mutiny, which also represented the biggest challenge to Putin's own rule since he came to power in 1999.
Since when do Western politicians and media need evidence?
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Friday that such suggestions were "an absolute lie." Asked whether Putin might attend Prigozhin's funeral, Peskov said it was too early to say and also noted the president's "busy schedule."
Wagner fighters played a prominent role in the fighting in Eastern Ukraine, especially in the months-long siege of the city of Bakhmut, despite Prigozhin's frequent, profanity-laced attacks on Russia's military high command over their conduct of the war that culminated in the failed mutiny.
The Kremlin has also used the Wagner Group as a tool to expand Russia's presence in the Middle East and Africa.
The Wagner fighters have now left Ukraine and some have relocated to neighbouring Belarus under the terms of a deal that ended their mutiny.
Some are expected to be absorbed into Russia's armed forces, but many will be angry over the sudden demise of the group's founder who inspired a high degree of loyalty among his men.
Putin paid a mixed tribute to Prigozhin on Thursday, describing him as a "talented businessman" but also as a flawed character who "made serious mistakes in life."
Kuzhenkino, RU
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