Exiled Ukrainian Military Officer Aids U.S. Money-Laundering Probe
08/11/2001 | ctryk
August 10, 2001
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Business and Finance - Europe
Exiled Ukrainian Military Officer
Aids U.S. Money-Laundering Probe
By STEVE LEVINE
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
ALMATY, Kazakstan -- A former military officer who secretly tape-recorded Ukraine President Leonid Kuchma is cooperating with a U.S. Justice Department probe of alleged money laundering by figures from the former Soviet state, according to people familiar with the case.
Mykola Melnichenko, who was part of Mr. Kuchma's security detail for six years, obtained political asylum in the U.S. in April. Mr. Melnichenko, 26 years old, fled Ukraine after it was disclosed that he was part of a covert operation that recorded Mr. Kuchma's private conversations in his office.
In recent years, the U.S. has become something of a court of last resort for critics and dissidents from states of the former Soviet Union. In June, for example, the U.S. granted political asylum to two former police detectives from Belarus. In a statement, a U.S. State Department spokesman said the pair, Dmitry Petrushkevich and Oleg Sluchek, had "detailed and credible revelations" of an assassination squad allegedly run by the government of Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko against political opponents and others.
Mr. Melnichenko's recordings have been subpoenaed by a federal grand jury in San Francisco that indicted former Ukrainian prime minister Pavlo Lazarenko for allegedly laundering $114 million in the U.S. Mr. Lazarenko, who fled to the U.S. in 1999, is in jail in California.
Justice Department lawyers and officials of the Federal Bureau of Investigation have listened to some of the tapes and questioned Mr. Melnichenko several times to determine whether charges are justified against other people from Ukraine, the people familiar with the case say. The figures under examination include current and former senior Ukraine state officials and their associates, these people say.
The Justice Department said it doesn't comment on investigations.
Mr. Melnichenko says he has hundreds of hours of recordings produced on a digital system in Mr. Kuchma's office. Initially, Mr. Kuchma denied that anyone could have carried out such an operation. He later acknowledged that the voice on the recordings was his but said the contents were doctored. Other participants in some recordings, however, have authenticated their parts of the conversations.
When the tapes were released in November, they provoked months of street protests in the Ukrainian capital of Kiev.
Write to Steve LeVine at steve.levine@wsj.com
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Business and Finance - Europe
Exiled Ukrainian Military Officer
Aids U.S. Money-Laundering Probe
By STEVE LEVINE
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
ALMATY, Kazakstan -- A former military officer who secretly tape-recorded Ukraine President Leonid Kuchma is cooperating with a U.S. Justice Department probe of alleged money laundering by figures from the former Soviet state, according to people familiar with the case.
Mykola Melnichenko, who was part of Mr. Kuchma's security detail for six years, obtained political asylum in the U.S. in April. Mr. Melnichenko, 26 years old, fled Ukraine after it was disclosed that he was part of a covert operation that recorded Mr. Kuchma's private conversations in his office.
In recent years, the U.S. has become something of a court of last resort for critics and dissidents from states of the former Soviet Union. In June, for example, the U.S. granted political asylum to two former police detectives from Belarus. In a statement, a U.S. State Department spokesman said the pair, Dmitry Petrushkevich and Oleg Sluchek, had "detailed and credible revelations" of an assassination squad allegedly run by the government of Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko against political opponents and others.
Mr. Melnichenko's recordings have been subpoenaed by a federal grand jury in San Francisco that indicted former Ukrainian prime minister Pavlo Lazarenko for allegedly laundering $114 million in the U.S. Mr. Lazarenko, who fled to the U.S. in 1999, is in jail in California.
Justice Department lawyers and officials of the Federal Bureau of Investigation have listened to some of the tapes and questioned Mr. Melnichenko several times to determine whether charges are justified against other people from Ukraine, the people familiar with the case say. The figures under examination include current and former senior Ukraine state officials and their associates, these people say.
The Justice Department said it doesn't comment on investigations.
Mr. Melnichenko says he has hundreds of hours of recordings produced on a digital system in Mr. Kuchma's office. Initially, Mr. Kuchma denied that anyone could have carried out such an operation. He later acknowledged that the voice on the recordings was his but said the contents were doctored. Other participants in some recordings, however, have authenticated their parts of the conversations.
When the tapes were released in November, they provoked months of street protests in the Ukrainian capital of Kiev.
Write to Steve LeVine at steve.levine@wsj.com