People's Deputy Maryana Bezuhla (Servant of the People) may be expelled from the National Security and Defence Committee. The corresponding draft resolution was submitted by her faction colleague Fedir Venislavskyy.
MP Venislavskyy believes that Bezuhla provided her colleagues in the committee with "deliberately false information, which in itself contains signs of a criminal offence." MP Bezuhla attributes the plans for her expulsion to "the struggle against Serhiy Lyovochkin's presence on the committee," a former MP of the banned pro-Russian party OPFL.
"The explanatory note clearly states everything," Venislavskyy told LB.
The note to the draft law states that "at a meeting of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Security, Defence and Intelligence on 16 February 2023, during the second reading of the draft Law of Ukraine on amendments to certain legislative acts of Ukraine on national security and defence to strengthen democratic civilian control over the Armed Forces of Ukraine, improve the unified command of the state's defence forces and planning in the areas of national security and defence (Reg. No. 4210), MP, Deputy Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Security, Defence and Intelligence Maryana Bezuhla provided MPs - members of the Committee on National Security, Defence and Intelligence with knowingly false information about her personal preliminary approval of the version of the draft law 4210 text prepared for the second reading with the Defence Intelligence of Ukraine, as evidenced by the audio recording of the Committee's meeting. At the same time, no documents were provided to the Committee members to confirm this information."
At the same time, according to the letter of the Chief of the Defence Intelligence of Ukraine Kyrylo Budanov dated 22.02.2023 No. 222/6/78 addressed to the Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Security, Defence and Intelligence Oleksandr Zavitnevych, the Draft Law 4210 is not supported by the Defence Intelligence of Ukraine.
"Thus, the People's Deputy of Ukraine, Deputy Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Security, Defence and Intelligence, Maryana Bezuhla, deliberately misled the People's Deputies of Ukraine - members of the Committee by providing the People's Deputies of Ukraine with knowingly false information, which in itself contains signs of a criminal offence under Part 1 of Article 351 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine. In addition, the provision of knowingly false information to MPs of Ukraine - members of the Committee on National Security, Defence and Intelligence to induce them to make or not make decisions on issues considered by the Committee poses a direct threat to the national security of Ukraine, especially in the context of martial law. Such actions of the People's Deputy of Ukraine indicate that she, as Deputy Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Security, Defence and Intelligence, is not properly fulfilling her duties, and her further work in the Committee on National Security, Defence and Intelligence poses a threat to the national security of Ukraine under martial law," the note says.
In a conversation with LB, Maryana Bezuhla emphasized that her colleague's draft resolution came as a surprise.
"A few days ago, he sent me a draft in my personal mail as a warning, and I asked what it was... Perhaps it is connected to my struggle against Lyovochkin (MP of the former OPFL faction) being in the committee," she did not rule out.
Updated. On her Facebook page, Bezuhla explained draft law 4210.
"The General Staff proposed to create a separate intelligence agency. I contacted Budanov, he gave his specialists to work on it, and we removed the following wording in the draft for the second reading. I mentioned this work at the committee meeting. There is a recording - an audio protocol. Moreover, none of the versions of the table for the second reading have been voted on by the committee. This is the working process of preparing the document," Bezuhla wrote.
According to her, then she received a letter signed by Budanov stating that the GUR was against draft law 4210 because a separate intelligence agency was being created.
"Neither the version of the 1st reading that we voted for nor the current working table contains this. I'm not ready to answer who sent him such a letter for signature (and actually misled him?) and what kind of trouble it is, and I don't think it's appropriate to comment further," Bezuhla added.
Earlier, Bezuhla registered a draft resolution to exclude Lovochkin from the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Security, Defence and Intelligence.