The Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) has detained "a former coal industry minister" of the self-proclaimed Luhansk People's Republic (LPR).

"He became head of a ministry set up by terrorists to illegally misappropriate Ukrainian coal resources in May last year with support from then LPR head [Valery] Bolotov. By the end of August 2014, the pseudo-official managed coal enterprises in Ukraine's temporary occupied territories in the terrorists' interests," the SBU said in a statement available on its website.

The SBU said that the money from selling the coal had been illegally taken by the heads of the LPR terrorist organization.

The SBU counterintelligence division on March 31 detained the man after he fled from the LPR and was hiding "in the building of a former kindergarten, which he had illegally privatized and turned into his own estate."

The SBU said its investigators have opened a criminal case on charges of involvement in the activities of a terrorist organization. If found guilty, the man faces up to 15 years imprisonment.