Ukraine Fires Top Prosecutor, Risking Ire of Western Donors

Ukraine fired its top prosecutor in a move that risks alienating international donors who backed him to clean up one of the country’s most corrupt institutions.

Parliament on Thursday approved the dismissal of Ruslan Ryaboshapka, 43, who had worked at Transparency International, saying he hadn’t made sufficient progress to prosecute crooked officials since his appointment six months ago.

“My personal opinion is very simple,” President Volodymyr Zelenskiy told a meeting of entrepreneurs before parliament’s special session. “If there’s no result, the official should vacate the position.”

The chief prosecutor’s job has become highly politicized in Ukraine and beyond. A predecessor of Ryaboshapka was a key figure in U.S. President Donald Trump’s unsubstantiated graft allegations against former Vice President Joe Biden.

Ryaboshapka pledged to look at that case when he was appointed but no investigations were carried out, with Ukraine going on to feature at the heart of Trump’s eventual impeachment by the U.S. House. Trump was later acquitted by the Senate.

Ryaboshapka’s removal is part of a wide-ranging government reshuffle that’s swept aside many of the fresh faces hired to clean up Ukraine’s murky post-Soviet politics. The prime minister and respected ministers of finance and economy and agriculture were casualties. The new health minister served under President Viktor Yanukovych, who was ousted by protesters in 2014 and fled to Russia.

Bank Case

Critics of the prosecutor general cite the case of billionaire Igor Kolomoisky, who’s accused of a multibillion-dollar fraud that led to the 2016 nationalization of Privatbank, Ukraine’s No. 1 lender. Kolomoisky, who’s had business ties in the past with President Zelenskiy, denies wrongdoing and hasn’t been charged.

Ryaboshapka says investigations opened under his predecessor need to be restarted from the beginning, which takes time. His office has put some tycoons on wanted lists.

“We’ve conducted reforms and we’re getting rid of the prosecutors you used to settle your issues, and surely you don’t like that,” he told lawmakers Wedesday.

“When the anti-corruption bureau together with the Prosecutor General’s Office work together, it can lead to unpleasant consequences for certain oligarchs and those close to them,” he later told reporters. “We have made good progress on the Privatbank case, and that prompts some people to move quickly and in a cynical way.”

Zelenskiy, a TV comic with no political experience before he took office last year, campaigned on an anti-graft platform. Ukraine ranks 126th in Berlin-based Transparency International’s annual Corruption Perceptions Index -- alongside Azerbaijan and Kyrgyzstan.

The issue is key to hopes of securing a $5.5 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund. Talks have been dragging on for months amid concern over Privatbank.