NABU and SAPO have exposed the former head of the State Border Guard Service, Serhii Deineka, and a current SBGS official for systematically receiving undue advantage for facilitating the unimpeded crossing of the state border to smuggle cigarettes from Ukraine to the EU.
The NABU and the SAPO have announced this, the Ukrainian News agency reports.
The suspects include: the former head of the State Border Guard Service, a general; the head of the department of the State Border Guard Service checkpoint; a former official of the State Border Guard Service.
They are suspected of committing a crime under Part 4 of Article 27, Part 4 of Article 368.
The investigation believes that in 2023, a group of people organized the smuggling of cigarettes across the state border of Ukraine to the EU. This was facilitated by top officials of the State Border Guard Service, for which they regularly received illegal benefits.
In July-November 2023 alone, border guards received at least EUR 204,000 of undue advantage for the unimpeded passage of 68 vehicles (EUR 3000 for each vehicle).
To conceal their activities, the suspects used vehicles registered in the Czech Republic and Austria, on which they installed special license plates similar to diplomatic ones.
The passengers of such cars were holders of diplomatic passports - family members of Ukrainian diplomats in Europe. The presence of such passengers allowed to avoid inspection of the cars by the border and customs authorities of the EU states. At the same time, detectives found that top officials of the State Border Guard Service had previously served with diplomats whose relatives later became involved in this scheme.
As the Ukrainian News agency earlier reported, NABU and SAPO came with searches to the former head of the State Border Guard Service, Serhii Deineka. Deineka was appointed an advisor to the Minister of Internal Affairs. In June 2019, Zelenskyy appointed Serhii Deineka as the head of the State Border Guard Service. Previously, Deineka was the head of the Luhansk border guard detachment.
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