U.S. cites ‘burdens’ on civil society
The U.S. State Department is calling on Ukraine to repeal a law that it says has put undue burdens on civil society organizations and is for that reason discouraging their work. The law requires civil-society groups and international members of the supervisory boards of state-owned enterprises to declare their assets – a requirement that the department said was excessive. “Ukraine’s asset-declaration system should hold public officials accountable, and not place unnecessary burdens or pressure on civil society,” department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said in a statement on March 30. “This punitive law targets those very individuals who seek to increase transparency and accountability in Ukraine, fulfilling the promises of the Euro-Maidan and the Ukrainian people’s aspirations for a democratic country governed by the rule of law,” she said. “We urge the Ukrainian government to expeditiously cancel the asset declaration requirements, in line with recommendations by the Venice Commission, and, in the interim, provide a temporary amnesty for those individuals who do not file declarations by the upcoming deadline.” (RFE/RL)
Ukrainian journalist pleads not guilty
Ukrainian journalist Roman Sushchenko, whom Russia has charged with espionage in a case seen by rights activists as politically motivated, has entered a not guilty plea as his trial began in Moscow. Mr. Sushchenko’s lawyer, Mark Feigin, wrote on Twitter that the Moscow City Court started the trial on March 27, and that his client pleaded not guilty. Mr. Sushchenko, a Paris-based correspondent of the Ukrinform news agency, was detained in Moscow in 2016 on suspicion of collecting classified information. Kyiv and rights activists say Russia has jailed several Ukrainians on trumped up, politically motivated charges since Moscow seized Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in March 2014 and threw its support behind armed separatists in eastern Ukraine. A year ago, the European Parliament called on Russia to free more than 30 Ukrainian citizens who were in prison or other conditions of restricted freedom in Russia, Crimea, and parts of eastern Ukraine that are controlled by Russia-backed separatists. The list included Mr. Sushchenko and filmmaker Oleh Sentsov, who is serving a 20-year sentence in a Russian prison after being convicted of plotting terrorist attacks in a trial supporters called absurd. The list, which the Parliament statement said was not complete, also included several leaders of the Crimean Tatar minority, which rights groups say has faced abuse and discrimination since Russia’s takeover. (RFE/RL)
Ex-prisoner Soloshenko dies at 75
A Ukrainian man who was freed from a Russian prison and returned home in a high-profile prisoner exchange in 2016 has died at the age of 75. Yuriy Soloshenko died on April 4, Verkhovna rada Vice-Chair Iryna Herashchenko wrote on Facebook. According to Ms. Herashchenko, Mr. Soloshenko had been diagnosed with cancer several years ago. Despite his age and illness, Mr. Soloshenko “endured imprisonment with dignity,” Hennadiy Afanasyev, who was released from Russian custody along with Mr. Soloshenko in June 2016, wrote on Facebook. Mr. Afanasyev called Mr. Soloshenko “our hero” and “my grandpa.” A former electronics plant chief, Mr. Soloshenko was arrested by Russian authorities in Moscow in August 2014 and accused of trying to buy restricted components for the S-300 air-defense missile system. He was sentenced to six years in prison in October 2015. Mr. Afanasyev is a Crimean photographer who was arrested months after Russia seized control of the peninsula and sentenced to seven years in prison after being convicted of plotting a terrorist act against the Russian-imposed authorities. Messrs. Soloshenko and Afanasyev were exchanged for two people – also Ukrainians – who were in Ukrainian custody on charges related to their alleged support for Russia-backed separatists. Their release was seen as an attempt by Moscow to erode support in the West for the continuation of sanctions imposed on Russia in response to its takeover of Crimea and its support for the separatists in a conflict that has killed more than 10,300 people in eastern Ukraine since April 2014. (RFE/RL)
Police bust military equipment market
Amphibious armored-personnel carriers and infantry fighting vehicles, off-road transport trucks, tanker trucks and trailers were among some 200 objects that have been seized by Ukrainian police after being offered for sale online. Vyacheslav Pechenenko, regional police chief of the Zhytomyr region, said on March 27 that the vehicles were discovered by police while investigating an oil pipeline leak in the town of Novohrad-Volynskyi some two weeks ago. They were seized this week during raids by his officers and local military prosecutors. Police said the vehicles were for sale on the Internet. Mr. Pechenenko said that “as of now, the origin of the hardware is being looked into, including when it was registered at military units.” Novohrad-Volynskiy is the headquarters for several Ukrainian military units subordinate to Operational Command North, including the 30th Mechanized Brigade, the 12th Operative Support Regiment and the 54th Scout Battalion, the Kyiv Post reported. The seizure of the military vehicles and equipment has sparked a scandal in Ukrainian defense circles and shone a light on a murky online marketplace where equipment made for the battlefields of eastern Ukraine is being offered for sale to civilians. It is still unclear if any of the seized military equipment came from any of those units. Police did not say where the military items had been advertised. The former presidential spokesman for the military operation in eastern Ukraine, Andriy Lysenko, who is now a spokesman for the Prosecutor-General’s Office, claimed the police information was “untrue” and said the equipment had been “demilitarized.” He wrote on Facebook: “In fact, the equipment in question is not combat and is not military at all.” Presidential adviser Yuriy Biriukov, in a post on Facebook, called the reports “fake news” and their authors “common liars, who rejoice in fake news, together with those who destroyed our army.” Punctuating his post, he added that they were “worse than the enemy.” Rather than having been stolen, the vehicles were more likely to have been military surplus bought by civilians under a government decree signed in 2008 by then-Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, Mr. Biriukov suggested. He claimed that none of those vehicles specifically had been recorded as ever having been used by the military in the past 10 years. Zhytomyr police said they were working to track down the origin of the equipment. They are treating the case as one possibly involving official embezzlement and abuse of power, the punishment for which can be between three and eight years’ imprisonment. (Christopher Miller of RFE/RL)
Facebook deletes pages tied to ‘troll factory’
Facebook says it has deleted dozens of pages linked to a Russian “troll factory” that was indicted in the United States for political activities aimed at influencing the 2016 U.S. presidential election. The company said in an announcement late on April 3 that it had removed 70 Facebook accounts, 138 Facebook pages, and 65 Instagram accounts, 95 percent of which were in the Russian language. It said the deleted accounts and pages had 1 million followers on Facebook and 500,000 on Instagram, mainly in Russia, Ukraine and nearby countries such as Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan. The pages deleted discussed domestic and international political issues, promoted Russian culture and tourism, and touched on “more everyday issues,” Facebook said, providing samples of the deleted pages in its announcement. The network said many of the deleted articles and pages were posted by the Russian-based Federal News Agency, known as FAN, which it said appears to be connected to a St. Petersburg “troll factory” known as the Internet Research Agency or IRA, which was indicted by U.S. Special Counsel Robert Mueller in February. Facebook Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg told Reuters in an interview that FAN “has repeatedly acted to deceive people and manipulate people around the world, and we don’t want them on Facebook anywhere.” He added that it was clear that FAN and other actors targeted by Facebook’s latest round of deletions were “controlled and operated” by IRA. Under a new policy, Facebook said it would take down all postings that are spread by what it sees as “bad actors,” even if the postings themselves seem harmless. (RFE/RL, with reporting by Reuters)
Spain breaks up cybercrime gang
Spanish authorities have broken up a cybercrime syndicate of Ukrainian and Russian nationals that allegedly stole more than 1 billion euros ($1.24 billion U.S.) from bank accounts over more than four years. The Interior Ministry on March 26 said the gang’s alleged mastermind, identified as a Ukrainian and named only as “Denis K.,” was arrested in the coastal city of Alicante, along with three accomplices who it said were Russian and Ukrainian citizens. In a statement, the ministry said the group “infected with malicious software the computer systems of banks, mainly in Russia, but also in Belarus, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Taiwan, taking control of critical systems that allowed them to empty ATMs remotely, alter balances or modify accounts.” Since it began operating in 2013, the group “managed to gain access to practically all of Russia’s banks and make withdrawals from ATMs in Madrid for half a million euros,” the statement also said. Earlier on March 26, Europe’s law enforcement agency announced that the cybercrime group’s suspected mastermind was arrested in Alicante following an investigation conducted by the Spanish National Police with the support of Europol, the U.S. FBI, Romanian, Belarusian and Taiwanese authorities, as well as private cybersecurity companies. Europol did not disclose the person’s name or nationality. It said in a statement that the gang used malware known as Carbanak and Cobalt to target more than 100 banks in more than 40 countries since late 2013. Europol said the group distributed the malware as e-mail attachments sent out to bank workers. The software gave the cybercriminals remote control of infected machines, providing them with access to the internal banking network and infecting servers controlling ATMs. According to the Spanish Interior Ministry, the criminals relied first on individuals linked first with Russian and then later with Moldovan organized crime to extract money from cash machines that had been targeted with the malware. The earnings were converted into Bitcoin at exchange houses in Russia and Ukraine, the ministry said. Financial platforms in Gibraltar and Britain were then used to “load prepaid cards with this cryptocurrency and spend them in Spain on all kinds of goods and services,” including cars and homes. The Interior Ministry said that police seized jewels worth 500,000 euros and two luxury cars during the raid in Alicante. Bank accounts and two homes valued at about 1 million euros were also blocked. (RFE/RL, with reporting by AFP and Reuters)