MOSCOW, November 19. /TASS/. The Verkhovna Rada (Ukraine’s parliament) approved by a majority vote the resignation of Energy Minister Svetlana Grinchuk, who was involved in a corruption scandal, according to a live broadcast on the Rada TV channel.
The decision was supported by 315 lawmakers, with no abstentions or votes against; at the same time, 21 deputies did not participate in the vote.
Lawmaker Mariana Bezuglaya previously stated that Grinchuk may have already left the country. Earlier on Wednesday, the Rada also accepted the resignation of Justice Minister German Galushchenko, who was involved in a corruption scandal, by a majority vote. The first attempt to vote on the ministers' resignations on November 18 failed when lawmakers from the party of former Ukrainian President Pyotr Poroshenko (listed as a person involved in extremist activities or terrorism by Russia’s financial watchdog Rosfinmonitoring) blocked the parliament's podium, forcing the session to be canceled.
Last week, Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Sviridenko announced that Grinchuk and Galushchenko had sent statements of resignation to parliament in connection with the corruption scandal.
On November 10, Ukraine’s National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO) announced a large-scale operation dubbed Midas to uncover a major corruption scheme in the energy sector. Searches were conducted at the home of Timur Mindich, who is often referred to as Zelensky’s "wallet," as well as at the residence of Justice Minister German Galuschenko, who had previously served as Minister of Energy, and at the Energoatom company. The NABU then began publishing excerpts from conversations in Mindich’s apartment, during which corruption schemes were discussed.
On November 11, NABU filed the first charges, including Mindich as the head of a criminal organization, as well as former Deputy Prime Minister and ex-Minister of National Unity Alexey Chernyshov, who remains chummy with Zelensky. On the same day, the government prematurely terminated the powers of the supervisory board of Energoatom, and on November 12, the Verkhovna Rada received resignation letters from Galushchenko and Energy Minister Svetlana Grinchuk. Mindich, who is called Zelensky’s friend and "wallet," left Ukraine a few hours before the searches to Israel.