Court Upholds Arrest of Fugitive Odesa Politician Viktor Baransky After Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Appeal

The Appellate Chamber of the High Anti-Corruption Court of Ukraine upheld the prosecutor's appeal and overturned the decision of the HACCU, which refused to arrest former Odesa City Council deputy Viktor Baransky in absentia.

According to the court's ruling, after Viktor Baranskyi's detention and no later than forty-eight hours after his delivery to the place of criminal proceedings, the investigating judge, the court with the participation of the suspect or the accused must consider the application of the chosen preventive measure.

This may or may not be detention. The fact is that on January 14, the High Anti-Corruption Court refused to arrest the former MP, so the prosecutor of the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office appealed to the Appeals Chamber. The politician's defense lawyers insisted on closing the appeal proceedings, but in vain.

Viktor Baransky was elected from the Opposition Platform - For Life party. He continued to be a deputy even when his companies started exporting Russian oil. The Odesa resident was deprived of his Ukrainian citizenship only in February 2023.

In April 2024, a deputy of the Odesa City Council, Viktor Baransky, was deprived of his powers because he lost his Ukrainian citizenship.

Earlier, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine received permission from the High Anti-Corruption Court to conduct a pre-trial investigation in absentia against fugitive Odesa businessman Viktor Baransky. In particular, the court upheld the prosecutor's appeal and granted permission for a special pre-trial investigation into the seizure of 32 vessels of the Ukrainian Danube Shipping Company.

The NABU and the SAPO served suspicion notices to two former deputies of the Odesa Regional Council and four others of seizing 32 vessels of the Danube Shipping Company for more than UAH 80 million. According to the investigation, the deputies organized a scheme to seize the vessels of the Ukrainian Shipping Company in August 2017. The vessels were transferred for charter to a controlled company, which then transported them to Turkey. There, they dismantled the lighters and built larger barges from them, after which the organizers towed them to Ukraine for their own commercial purposes.

Кирило Бойко