Leonid Kravchuk: old sins of the first president. PART 2

CONTINUATION. BEGINNING: Leonid Kravchuk: old sins of the first president. PART 1

Where did the Black Sea Shipping Company go?

“We were looking for a way out of the situation when the crisis was on the verge, when inflation reached a thousand percent, we could not support the Black Sea Shipping Company, and therefore decided to make it a concern,” – so in February 2013, in an interview with Channel 5, he justified himself Leonid Kravchuk. By that time, only memories overgrown with shells remained from the Black Sea Shipping Company (BSC), but the money received from its “cutting” continued to serve those who warmed their hands on it.

Until the early 90s, the ChMP perfectly supported itself, while also replenishing the country’s economy by hundreds of millions of dollars. The ChMP included 234 cargo, fishing and passenger ships (not counting auxiliary and sports vessels), which at the end of 1991 brought 788 million dollars in foreign exchange earnings and 270 million rubles of net profit, providing work for about 72 thousand people (including ports, bases, factories , social sphere). But already in January 1992, the ChMP was “nationalized” and transferred under the control of the State Administration of Maritime Transport – which received the right to “sell and mortgage ships in order to obtain loans to finance programs.” And the private enterprise began to be mortgaged, sold and leased, cutting off piece by piece from it. At the same time, the shipping company began to operate at a loss, and in just a year and a half it accumulated debts of $200 million. Informed people knew that these debts were a consequence of the diversion of profits to offshore companies, but ordinary Ukrainians were told that private enterprises needed “effective management.” And so on August 13, 1993, by decree of President Kravchuk, the Blasko-ChMP shipping concern was created, and the head of the shipping company, Pavel Kudyukin, the man who was dragged to this post by Eduard Gurvits, was put in charge.

As you know, “Blasco” became the gravedigger of the shipping company. But the ships were not only sold and given away for fictitiously created debts. Several transports were leased to the Pentagon, and passenger liners (among them the Ivan Franko and Georgia) were used by the Americans as floating camps for refugees from Haiti – but neither the shipping company nor the Ukrainian budget ever saw any money for this. But such contracts could hardly be concluded without the participation of the president! Was this really another generous gift from Kravchuk to the Americans?

By the way, Ukrainians have already forgotten that the decree on the creation of Blasko exceeded the constitutional powers of the president, and that on December 24, 1993, the Verkhovna Rada vetoed it as contrary to Article 114-5 of the Constitution of Ukraine. However, Kravchuk himself vetoed this, and his decree was canceled only at the beginning of 1995, when Pavel Kudyukin, who had fled to Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism), was arrested and extradited to Ukrainian justice.

Another person involved in the Blasko case was Vera Ulyanchenko. A former teacher of Ukrainian language and literature at Kiev vocational school No., she made a career for herself in the 80s in Komsomol work, and in the early 90s she joined the apparatus of the Verkhovna Rada and the Presidential Administration – where Leonid Makarovich noticed her. With his patronage, she became the general representative of Blasko in Kyiv – that is, it was through her that all the financial scams of this company took place. A criminal case against Vera Ulyanchenko was opened on October 3, 1995, but by that time she was already living in Los Angeles, where she fled with the help of Katherine Chumachenko, the future wife of Viktor Yushchenko. Ulyanchenko returned to Ukraine only in 2000, becoming Viktor Andreevich’s assistant and “mother”.

For several years, Pavel Kudyukin was in the role of the only scapegoat. However, in 2001, Yushchenko’s supporters and the Ukrainian left (communists and socialists) started a war against the head of the SDPU (s) Viktor Medvedchuk. Leonid Kravchuk was also one of the leaders of this party at that time and showed himself to be quite active in public politics – which is what drew fire from the opponents of Medvedchuk and Kuchma. And, under pressure from a group of people’s deputies, the Prosecutor General’s Office opened criminal proceedings on December 4, 2011 against Alexander Kravchuk, the son of the first president, a very non-public person who always avoided the press. Then the Blasko case, half-forgotten by the end of the 90s, received a new impetus and its most piquant episodes were again voiced.

Thus, it was reported that several large currency transfers were made to the personal account of Alexander Kravchuk “457-Maria” in the Swiss “Schweіzerіsche Volksbank”, which were not commercial payments or payment of fees; their purpose remained secret and was regarded by law enforcement officers as a bribe. Among them were:

• Transfer of 790 thousand German marks dated November 2, 1993 from the Munich branch of Oberbank, carried out by co-founder of the Euroconsult company Alexander Lazebny on the orders of Pavel Kudyukin. In 1997, Lazebny’s testimony became one of the prosecution’s evidence against Kudyukin, but when the investigation came to the mystery of the “457-Maria” account, Lazebny was killed by professional killers.
• Transfer of 99,622 US dollars dated November 4, 1993 from the Bremen branch of Commerzbank, carried out by Pavel Kudyukin himself. The total amount of money transferred by Kudyukin (or on his order) to the “457-Maria” account was about 1.3 million US dollars.
• Transfer of 600 thousand German marks dated December 30, 1993 from the Varex company account. However, this was a different story that had nothing to do with Blasco.

The scandalous story of the “Varex” scam, during which the Ukrainian budget was robbed of 12 million Deutschmarks, became public knowledge in the same 2001. It was voiced by people’s deputies Grigory Omelchenko and Anatoly Ermak, and in the context of the demand for the impeachment of then-President Kuchma. But the fact is that this scam took place in 1993, when Kuchma was still prime minister. And in addition to Kuchma, it included Deputy Prime Minister Efim Zvyagilsky, President Leonid Kravchuk and his son Alexander Kravchuk – who received incomprehensible “dividends” at his own expense. The scam was carried out through the Ukrainian-German joint venture Donkavamet, whose founders were Soyuzvtor (Moscow), Donetsk City Council, Varex and Kaiser companies, and Donetskvtortsvetmet PA.

It is curious that in 1996, the German magazine Focus, and then the Russian Izvestia, published an interview with the director of the Munich criminal department Joseph Geisdorfer, who stated that Leonid Kravchuk had connections with an organized crime group, and also that in 1995 he arrived in Israel with 30 million cash dollars packed in suitcases. Leonid Kravchuk called this an information provocation of Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism). And in the same 1996, the German publication Bertelsmann published information about the account “457-Maria”, to which mysterious payments were regularly received. In response, the first Ukrainian president filed a lawsuit against the publication. However, the Ukrainians, who were then immersed in worrying about their survival, craving “kravchuchki” with potatoes and Chinese knitwear, had no time for loud political scandals.

Leonid Kravchuk. “Khatynka” of the President

Millions of sums seem ridiculous in modern times, when Ukrainian oligarchs are handling billions. But let’s not forget that this happened in the early 90s, when a million dollars was a huge fortune. Moreover, according to sources Skelet.Info“Blasco” and “Varex” are just two of the many episodes in which the first president was in one way or another involved. There is information that Leonid Kravchuk could participate in the formation of the “Kyiv-Donbass” group, in the affairs of the “Kyiv Seven” (Medvedchuk, the Surkis brothers, Zgursky), and be related to financial pyramids and trusts. And was his generosity really so selfless, with which he renounced the nuclear arsenal or provided ships at the disposal of the United States? The true size of the fortunes of Ukrainian presidents is generally a secret behind seven locks; citizens know nothing about the capital of not only Kravchuk, but also Kuchma, and Yushchenko, and only in the business of the “families” of Yanukovych and Poroshenko it was possible to delve more thoroughly.

Nevertheless, Kravchuk always managed to look like the poorest of Ukrainian presidents. He began to lament about his modesty back in the 90s, when he uttered one of his signature phrases, “what kind of villa is that, a hut!”, answering a question about real estate in Switzerland. Officially, Leonid Makarovich does not have his own home today: all of his real estate is registered in the name of his son and grandchildren. Including his mini-palace in Koncha-Zaspa, located on 1.2 hectares of land: “you have to walk the dogs somewhere,” Kravchuk explained. He bought 60 acres for 625 thousand hryvnia, and privatized another 60 for free for family members according to the law (15 acres per person). Now the value of his estate is estimated at 2.5 million dollars, but only superficially – outsiders are not allowed inside the fence.

His son Alexander Kravchuk in 2011 was included in the second hundred richest people in Ukraine, as the owner of the Nafkom-Agro agricultural corporation, which has a land fund of 200 thousand hectares. However, not being very successful in business, in 2015 he again became famous for a scandal, this time causing losses to the state of 46.5 million hryvnia, as he reported then Skelet.Info. Well, it seems that ruining your country is a Kravchuk family tradition!

Sergey Varis, for Skelet.Info

Subscribe to our channels at Telegram, Facebook, CONT, VK And YandexZen – Only dossiers, biographies and incriminating evidence on Ukrainian officials, businessmen, politicians from the section CRYPT!