Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will pay an official visit to France on June 17 and to Germany on June 18, the Presidential Administration has reported.
“The program of the visits envisages meetings of the head of state with the leadership of France and Germany, the heads of parliaments, as well as with leading French and German business representatives,” the administration said on its Facebook page on Thursday.
President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky at a meeting with the delegation of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), led by its president Suma Chakrabarti, has assured that bilateral cooperation will be intensified and will become more efficient. “We thank you for being here and thank you for being the largest investor in Ukraine. I want to assure that we will extend our cooperation,” Zelensky said at the meeting.
He stressed that the strategy of the EBRD is fully consistent with the priorities of Ukraine, and expressed conviction that Ukraine and the bank together can work more efficiently. Zelensky noted that the country appreciates cooperation with the international partners: the EBRD, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.
The president noted he had already met with the representatives of the IMF, at which Ukraine’s progress in fulfilling its obligations under the Stand-By Arrangement was noted. According to Zelensky, the parties discussed the issue of continuing cooperation.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has dismissed 15 heads of regional state administrations, deputy head of the Presidential Administration Ruslan Riaboshapka has said.
“The first part of motions has arrived from the Cabinet of Ministers today for the dismissal of the heads of regional state administrations. So, governors have been dismissed in such regions as Chernihiv, Khmelnytsky, Kherson, Ternopil, Sumy, Poltava, Odesa, where the acting head has been suspended, as well as Mykolaiv, Lviv, Kirovohrad, Kyiv, Ivano-Frankivsk, Zaporizhia, Zakarpattia, and Volyn,” he said at a briefing on Tuesday outside the Presidential Administration’s building in Kyiv.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has proposed introducing criminal liability in the form of jail terms from five to 10 years for illegal enrichment and for changing the procedure of confiscating illegally obtained property from officials.
Corresponding presidential bill (No.10358) on amending some legislative acts regarding the confiscation of illegal assets of persons authorized to perform the functions of the state or local self-government and punishment for acquiring such assets was submitted to parliament on Monday. The text of the document was published on the parliament’s website on Tuesday.
For an official acquiring assets worth more 12,000 non-taxable minimum incomes of citizens exceeding his income, the bill proposes punish with imprisonment from five to 10 years with the deprivation of the right to hold certain positions or engage in certain activities for up to three years.
Corresponding Article 3685 “Illegal enrichment” is proposed to be introduced into Ukraine’s Criminal Code.
The draft law proposes amendments to the procedure for filing a claim for recognition of unjustified assets and their recovery into state revenue. The corresponding lawsuit will be filed by a representative of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) in coordination with the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO).
Current legislation provides that a lawsuit on the recognition of assets as unfounded may be brought against an official, in respect of whom a court conviction entered into legal force for committing a corruption offense or legalizing proceeds from crime. Under the current law, prosecutor takes measures to establish property to whom there is evidence that the person involved in the case received it, uses or disposes of it.
The new edition of this provision provides that a lawsuit is filed against unjustified assets received after the entry into force of the law, if it is enacted, and also within three years before the law enters into force, if the difference between the value of the assets and the official’s income exceeds 500 or more times the size of the subsistence minimum for able-bodied citizens.
Cases on the recognition of unjustified assets and their recovery in state revenue will be investigated by the Supreme Anti-Corruption Court.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has received U.S. President Donald Trump’s invitation to pay an official visit to Washington, the newspaper Dzerkalo Tyzhnia (Mirror Weekly) said on Saturday.
According to the newspaper, Zelensky received the invitation on May 31 and the visit may take place in August-September, “after a meeting between the U.S. president and the Russian one.”
Meanwhile, neither Washington, nor Kyiv have officially confirmed this information.
Findings of a public opinion poll conducted by the Oleksandr Yaremenko Ukrainian Institute for Social Research, the Social Monitoring Center, and the Institute of Economics and Forecasting of Ukraine’s National Academy of Sciences show that the majority of Ukrainians trust President Volodymyr Zelensky and the country’s armed forces.
According to the poll results, which were presented at Interfax-Ukraine’s office on Thursday, almost 58% of Ukrainians generally trust Zelensky, 35.1% are more likely to trust the president, and 23% of citizens trust him completely. Former President Petro Poroshenko had the trust of 15% of respondents (11.3% and 3.7%, respectively).
The Ukrainian Armed Forces enjoy the trust of more than 64% of respondents, the National Police 30.7%, law enforcement agencies 30.6%, the SBU Security Service of Ukraine 29.9%, the Prosecutor General’s Office 18.4%, and the National Anti-corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) 15.3%.
Some 22.9% of Ukrainians have confidence in the National Bank of Ukraine, 14.8% in the Cabinet, 13.3% in political parties, and 10.3% in the Verkhovna Rada, Ukraine’s parliament.
The poll was conducted in 24 Ukrainian regions and the city of Kyiv on May 10-18 and involved 2,100 people. The margin of error is between 1.31% and 2.18%.
