Tax police search business belonging to relatives of a likely parliamentary candidate

Election monitors report that on 19 July tax police carried out a search of the real estate firm Yarud Nerukhomist which bellows to the family of the head of the Mariupol branch of the Batkivshchyna Party, Oleksandr Yaroshenko.

According to the Front for Change, the search was carried out by 18 tax police officers who refused to provide documents confirming that the search was legal.  Members of staff, however, noticed that the document they had for the search referred to the old name of the business which was changed three years ago. The officers took away three hard disks with the firm’s documents and all accounting reports for the last three years.

The Tax Administration later posted a statement saying that the tax police had uncovered an interregional network of fictitious and transit enterprises. While Yaroshenko’s name is not mentioned, the statement does suggest certain parallels and analogies.  At a press conference Oleksandr Yaroshenko called the search political pressure. He pointed out that the documents held by the tax police had been about a firm that has had a different name for three years. His daughter’s name was on the document although she is only one of eight co-owners.

He said that what was happening to the opposition in the Donetsk region was political lawlessness. 

From a report by Oleksandr Klyuzhev from the Committee of Voters of Ukraine as part of the OPORA national campaign)