The existence of a scheme for stealing public funds organized by the criminal gang lead by former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych has been confirmed by 30 court sentences, Ukrainian Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko has said.

"Thanks to the brainstorming of all those involved in three years of work, we identified the right direction, resulting in 30 court verdicts. Some 30 persons have been sentenced for involvement in a criminal scheme of embezzlement and money laundering in the amount of $1.5 billion. Starting from the leaders of small enterprises, from where they started money laundering, to the first deputy minister of economy. All of them were convicted and recognized as members of the organized crime group led by Yanukovych, who caused losses to the state to the tune of $1.5 billion," he said during the meeting of the Rada Committee on National Security and Defense in Kyiv on Wednesday.

According to Lutsenko, these judgments established over 500 economic entities of Ukrainian and foreign jurisdictions "which took part in the plundering and laundering of funds for Yanukovych's organized crime group."

"The funds were laundered on the territory of Asian countries, Cyprus, Latvia and then they were brought into Ukrainian banks, where, under the pressure of the members of the organized criminal group, they issued domestic government loan bonds, which brought 9% income in foreign currency annually," the prosecutor general stressed.

Lutsenko said that he has a reply from the State Treasury dated January 15 of this year on $1.117 billion entering the foreign exchange account in April 2017.