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Yermak not planning to return to Ukraine yet — lawmaker

According to Verkhovna Rada deputy Yaroslav Zheleznyak, Andrey Yermak already has a meeting scheduled in Rome on Friday

MOSCOW, November 19. /TASS/. The head of Vladimir Zelensky’s office, Andrey Yermak, will not return to Ukraine by the promised deadlines amid the corruption scandal, Verkhovna Rada deputy Yaroslav Zheleznyak reported.

According to him, Yermak was to return with Zelensky from Turkey on November 20, but "Yermak is not and will not be in Turkey, and he will not return together with [Zelensky] on Thursday, nor even on Friday. According to my sources, he already has a meeting scheduled in Rome on Friday," Zheleznyak wrote.

Earlier, Ukrainian media reported Yermak had gone to London to meet with Ambassador Valeriy Zaluzhny. The scheduled meeting between Yermak and US envoy Stephen Whitkoff in Turkey was canceled amid the Mindich scandal.

Mindich case

On November 10, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO), both independent from Zelensky’s office, announced an investigation into a major corruption scheme in the energy sector, dubbed Operation Midas. Searches were conducted at the Energoatom energy company and the residences of entrepreneur Timur Mindich and the now suspended Justice Minister German Galushchenko, who served as the country’s energy minister at the time of the events that are being looked into. The investigation found that participants in the scheme had laundered around $100 million. NABU also started to release recordings of conversations from Mindich’s apartment, which revealed discussions of corrupt practices.

On November 11, along with Mindich, charges in the case were brought against former Deputy Prime Minister and former Minister of National Unity Alexey Chernyshov, who is also seen as a member of Zelensky’s inner circle. On the same day, Ukraine’s government dissolved Energoatom’s board, and on November 12, Galushchenko and Energy Minister Svetlana Grinchuk tendered their resignation. However, Mindich, who some have called Zelensky’s "wallet," left the country a few hours before searches started, and is now in Israel.

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