'Lifting of freeze of some Yanukovych accounts' not related to funds subject to criminal proceedings – court
The decision made on April 17, 2019, which media presented as "the lifting of the freeze of accounts opened at National Bank for Development (VBR) affiliated with son of ex-president of Ukraine Viktor Yanukovych – Oleksandr Yanukovych" is not related to the funds, which are subject to the criminal proceedings, Shevchenkivsky district court in Kyiv has said.
According to the court's press service, on April 17, the court granted the request of Ascor-Invest LLC to annul the seizure of assets.
During the examination, the court found that the funds that were subject to the criminal case were not in the accounts of Ascor-Invest.
"The specified funds were transferred as soon as they arrived to the accounts of Ascor-Invest LLC, to the accounts of other legal entities. Considering that Ascor-Invest LLC is not a legal entity in respect of which the criminal proceedings are being investigated, and no official of the company was not notified about suspicion in these criminal proceedings, there were no grounds provided for by the Code of Criminal Procedure of Ukraine for the application of security measures in the form of freeze of assets of the company," the court explained.
Spokesperson of the Prosecutor General Larysa Sarhan said on April 18, 2019 that judge of Shevchenkivsky district court in Kyiv Yevhen Martynov had decided not to lift the freeze of some accounts opened at VBR.
Earlier, on April 17, another judge of Shevchenkivsky district court in Kyiv, Oksana Holub, canceled freezing of accounts at the VBR bank. According to the spokesperson of the prosecutor general, UAH 1.2 billion were frozen in the VBR bank's accounts.
As reported, in order to protect the interests of investors and other lenders to the VBR bank in connection with the sanctions against the sole shareholder of this financial institution applied by the EU Council – Oleksandr Yanukovych, the NBU on November 27, 2014 decided to classify the bank as insolvent. The decision to liquidate the bank was made by the NBU on December 21, 2015.
According to media reports, Yanukovych's money in the VBR bank was frozen after Euromaidan. But in 2016-2017, the Pechersky district court in Kyiv began unfreezing of part of these accounts.
