Ukraine’s prosecutor general has resigned after investigators used ladders to raid his office in connection with a major corruption scandal that threatens to embarrass Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Ruslan Kravchenko resigned from his position on Monday after accusations that some of his officials were involved in large-scale money laundering. It was claimed they received cash to protect call centers involved in illegal phone scams. Kravchenko, who denies any wrongdoing, left his job after meeting Zelenskyy. The president of Ukraine also spoke with the heads of Nabu and Sapo, the two anti-corruption agencies that have uncovered an extensive criminal scheme involving government officials. Zelenskyy described his conversation with Kravchenko as “quite long” and said: “I’m sure you understand what we discussed.” The prosecutor’s resignation letter will be sent to Ukraine’s parliament, the Verkhovna Rada, he said. Kravchenko is the latest member of Zelenskyy’s inner circle linked to corruption. The accusations concern so-called call centers operating in Ukraine. Employees pose as banks, law enforcement agencies, or investment advisors, and persuade victims to transfer funds to crypto accounts or wallets under their control. Targets include Ukrainians, Russians and EU citizens. According to Nabu, a senior official in the attorney general’s office protected the criminal network and helped it launder its assets. Each “call center” paid $7,000 (£5,200) a month in protection money, police sources told Ukrainska Pravda newspaper. The bribes amounted to millions of dollars, he said, and hundreds of centers are believed to employ about 60,000 people nationwide. Nabu investigators raided Kravchenko’s office on Friday. Staff refused to let them in, so they used ladders to scale a metal gate. Kravchenko was not at work and had disappeared from his home, which was searched that same night. The main suspect was arrested in the western city of Lviv. Phone call recordings released by Nabu suggested he was overseeing repairs at Kravchenko’s home while simultaneously collecting bribes from fraudulent call centers. Nabu posted images over the weekend of a safe filled with wads of one-dollar bills. He said he had uncovered five officials behind the scheme, but did not name them. The money was spent on real estate, jewelry and other valuables, he said, laying out his evidence in a 30-minute video. Zelenskyy attempted to strip Nabu and Sapo of their independence last year, a move he reversed after protests in kyiv and other cities. There are further claims that the prosecution subsequently spied on Nabu staff and tried to obstruct their work. The revelations come at a time when Ukraine is under attack day and night by Russian drones and missiles. Three people were killed and 19 injured in overnight attacks in kyiv that sparked huge fires and left smoke hanging over the city. The attack marked the end of a three-day ceasefire in the capital after a visit on Sunday by Donald Trump’s envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. They visited Moscow on Saturday and met with Vladimir Putin. Zelenskyy said the two had contributed some “very good and valuable ideas” to ending the war, but did not elaborate. He said he hoped to meet with Trump in the next two weeks. Few expect a breakthrough, and the Kremlin said Tuesday that its forces were close to victory. As Russia stepped up its bombing, Ukrainians talked about corruption investigations and posted numerous comments on social media, said transparency advocate Olena Tregub. said. “It’s not even corruption. It’s organized crime, protecting illegal call centers that scammed people, not only in Ukraine but in Europe.” He said the anti-corruption investigations were different from previous ones because Nabu detectives were “very good technically.” “They are recording people in their homes, in their offices and on the phone,” he said. “They are outsmarting other law enforcement agencies that are fighting them and are able to record people who think everything is discreet.” He said the high-profile raids were “changing the culture in Ukraine” and making society less tolerant of ill-gotten wealth. Zelenskyy’s former business partner fled the country last year after being implicated in a corruption case involving the state nuclear energy company. Two ministers were fired. The president’s powerful chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, also later resigned after being questioned. Both deny any wrongdoing. Kravchenko rejected the allegations against him on Sunday, calling them “completely unfounded.” A day later, he said he did not want his position “to be used as a tool of political confrontation.” The deputy chairman of parliament’s law enforcement committee, Andriy Osadchuk, said the scandal underlined the need to reform the prosecutor’s service and called for key positions to be filled through open competition. Fighting corruption was also vital to kyiv’s bid for EU membership, he said. “It will be very difficult for Ukraine to move forward if we do not change the approach to selecting and appointing the prosecutor general and lower-level prosecutors,” Osadchuk said.
