Spain puts Ukrainian businessman Dmytro Firtash on wanted list
The Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office of Spain has put Ukrainian tycoon and head of the Board of Directors of the DF Group, Dmytro Firtash, who is suspected of money laundering in large amounts, on the international wanted list, Deutsche Welle reported citing a representative of the Prosecutor’s Office.
According to the edition, Firtash was declared wanted along with two accomplices, also citizens of Ukraine, whose surnames were not disclosed in the interest of the investigation. The representative from DW also noted that five other of Firtash’s accomplices were detained on the 24th of November along with the issuance of a warrant for searches in Barcelona and the resort town of Marbella. “They were directly involved in the laundering of funds belonging to the Ukrainian tycoon. A famous Spanish lawyer, Antonio de Fortuny, was among the detainees,” DW wrote.
According to the Prosecutor’s Office, these people have created a number of offshore companies in Panama for Firtash, though part of the funds stayed in Spain and was invested into the real estate market. The agency’s spokesperson said that it is tens of millions of Euros of illegally gained funds. The representative of the Prosecutor’s Office refused to give the exact amounts.
The spokesperson also reported that Dmytro Firtash’s case has been under consideration by the Prosecutor’s Office in Variola as of July 2016, following the arrest of the son of former Mayor of Kyiv, Leonid Chernovetskyi, Stepan Chernovetskyi, in Spain along with eleven other people who were also suspected of money laundering. Stepan Chernovetskyi was released from jail over the summer but he still remains under investigation.
“The documents that were found during searches conducted on the Chernovetskyi case helped investigators to reach Dmytro Firtash,” the representative of Prosecutor’s Office noted. However, he expressed doubt that the Ukrainian tycoon will ever be brought to Spanish justice. The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation has been vainly searching for Firtash in connection with more serious charges, including a bribe in exchange for a license to develop titanium deposits in India. Ukrainian authorities are also searching for him, DW wrote.
Firtash, was arrested in Austria on the 12th of March 2014 at the request of U.S. authorities. The Vienna Regional Court for Criminal Matters issued the custodial measure in the form of an extradition arrest, but agreed to release him on EUR 125 million bail and the commitment not to leave Austria. On the 30th of April 2015, the same court dismissed the request of the United States Department of Justice on the extradition of Firtash.
After the court hearings, Firtash stated in his interviews to journalists in Vienna that he is planning to return to Ukraine but he never did. The Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine, Arsen Avakov, stated that Firtash will be detained in the event of his return to Ukraine as requested by the U.S. Department of Justice.