NABU has accused a senior SBU official of threatening to use a weapon and obstructing the conduct of a search. The Bureau’s press service published the corresponding statement on the morning of 4 November.
It said that while detectives were carrying out lawful investigative actions on the basis of a ruling by an investigating judge of the High Anti-Corruption Court, one of the SBU’s senior officials “is threatening to use a firearm and is preventing detectives from accessing the location where the search is being conducted”. Special forces officers arrived at the search site.
“Such actions are unacceptable and obstruct the performance of NABU detectives’ lawful procedural duties,” the statement said.
According to sources cited by Ukrainska Pravda, the senior SBU official is Serhii Duka. Information about him appears on the CPC website “Who Is Destroying NABU and SAP”, dedicated to the key figures behind attempts to bring independent anti-corruption bodies under control. According to this information, he is the First Deputy Head of the Department for the Protection of National Statehood.
The CPC said that last July, the SBU allegedly carried out more than 50 searches of NABU employees under his leadership. As a result of those searches, detective Ruslan Mahamedrasulov was served with a notice of suspicion and spent months in pre-trial detention on allegations that he intended to trade with Russia.
After last year’s attempt to subordinate NABU and SAP to the Prosecutor General and the wave of searches of Bureau staff that accompanied it, director Semen Kryvonos warned this autumn that the SBU is preparing a new wave of suspicions against detectivesover a case involving their colleague Illia Vitiuk.