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Ex-Ukrainian president’s lawyer reports disappearance of prosecutor general

In the absence of the prosecutor general, the office will be occupied by his deputy

Ukrainian Prosecutor General Yuri Lutskenko AP Photo/Sergei Chuzavkov

Ukrainian Prosecutor General Yuri Lutskenko

© AP Photo/Sergei Chuzavkov

KIEV, July 22. /TASS/. Andrei Portnov, lawyer and former First Deputy Chief of Staff of the fourth Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich's administration, reported Prosecutor General Yuri Lutskenko’s disappearance on Monday.

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"Friends, I inform you that Prosecutor General Lutsenko has disappeared. [First Deputy Prosecutor General Dmitry] Storozhuk will serve as acting prosecutor general from now on," Portnov wrote on Facebook.

Later Yuri Lutsenko’s Press Secretary Larisa Sargan explained on Facebook that the prosecutor general did not disappear but "is on leave."

Over the past months, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau and the State Bureau of Investigation of Ukraine opened a number of cases against Lutsenko, and President Vladimir Zelensky asked Verkhovna Rada to dismiss the prosecutor general, but the "old" parliament and Lutsenko himself were against the step. Then Zelensky promised that Lutsenko would be removed from his position by the new Verkhovna Rada.

The Ukrainian parliamentary election was held on Sunday. According to the preliminary vote counting, the People’s Servant party, which supports the president, may receive 241 seats in the new parliament and independently form the majority. Then Lutsenko’s resignation will become inevitable.

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