Did someone want to deceive the European Court of Human Rights?
In 2015, the European Union obliged Ukraine to reimburse the Golden Mandarin Oil company for 54 million UAH, which the latter allegedly could not receive for five years by decision of a Ukrainian court. This decision against Ukraine was made under the procedure of friendly settlement of the dispute, that is, Ukraine itself admitted its guilt.
It would seem like an ordinary decision of the European Court, but it became a landmark decision for the state. The NABU suspected that the ECHR judges were misled by people associated with ex-People's Deputy Georgy Logvinsky.
How the defendants applied to the ECHR and where NABU suspected fraud - we will tell you further.
Why do you owe money to the “Golden Mandarin”?
The case dates back to the distant years 2008-2009, when Golden Mandarin Oil LLC took out a UAH 38 million loan from the state-owned Rodovid Bank. According to investigators, the company was actually controlled by Felix Kozakov. Remember this surname, it will appear later in our story.
Using loan funds, the company bought fuel oil from the state, which was used to produce electricity and heat at thermal power plants. The raw materials purchased for UAH 54 million were transferred for storage to CHPP-5 of the Kyivenergo company. The latter, according to the terms of the agreement, could use fuel oil, but upon request had to return it in full.
And so, when “Golden Mandarin” wanted to return the fuel oil, he failed to do so - this was the beginning of the 15-year history of the court case. The company went to court, and since then Kievenergo has become its debtor.
First, the Economic Court of Kyiv in April 2009 ordered the return of fuel oil to its rightful owner. After 20 days of “ignoring” from Kyivenergo, the company filed a new claim, after which it was no longer owed fuel oil, but its cost – the entire 54 million UAH.
But “Golden Mandarin” did not receive any money, because “Kievenergo” is an enterprise of the fuel and energy complex, from which, due to the moratorium, debts cannot be forcibly collected. Then, in October 2009, this was confirmed by the Kiev Economic Court of Appeal.
By the way, in 2012, the Constitutional Court of Ukraine will give its opinion, according to which only belonging to the fuel and energy complex is not a basis for suspending enforcement proceedings. Therefore, it is quite possible that the payment of the debt then failed due to imperfect legislation.
Meanwhile, the dispute between “Golden Mandarin” and “Kievenergo” lasted for years - the energy supplier even asked to defer the debt for 30 years.
Not getting what they wanted in Ukraine, the company went to conquer the European Court of Human Rights. And NABU began to suspect that this was part of a plan to deceive ECHR judges and seize state funds. The investigation believes that to implement it, Kozakov turned to People’s Deputy Georgy Logvinsky, who at that time held a number of positions in state and international institutions. In particular, he was an assistant to People's Deputy Mustafa Dzhemilev, and also had a wife, a judge of the ECHR.
How Logvinsky and the company applied to the ECHR
Logvinsky and the already mentioned Kozakov, according to the investigation, developed a plan according to which “Golden Mandarin” was to baselessly appeal to the ECHR with a complaint that the state did not comply with the 2009 decision against “Kievenergo”.
Further, according to the investigation, a number of people joined Logvinsky’s scheme. Among them, key roles were played by:
lawyer Alexandra Vladimirskaya, who represented the “Golden Mandarin” in the courts,
managers of the Ministry of Justice Natalya Bernatskaya (Sevostyanova) and Boris Babin, who lobbied for the decision to recognize the complaint at the ECHR,
accountant Lyudmila Trubchaninova and Logvinsky’s assistant Maria Shevkoplyas (Shvets), who helped legalize the funds received.
A number of people, according to law enforcement officers, did not know about the criminal plan of the defendants.
For example, expert Igor Karaman, who drafted and sent complaints to the ECHR on behalf of the company.
Before filing the complaint, lawyer Vladimirskaya helped “Golden Mandarin” sell the debt to the fictitious company “Issachar-Zevulon Import-Export” for 54 million UAH. As they say at NABU, this was done so that the funds won in the ECHR could not be collected for repayment at Rodovode of the very loan for which they bought the fuel oil.
In September 2013, “Golden Mandarin” filed a complaint for violation of Art. 6 and Art. 13 ECHR, as well as Art. 1 of the First Protocol. Namely, regarding the long-term failure to comply with a court decision and deprivation of the right to an effective remedy. The complaint remained in the European Court for another two years.
And here the investigation found another sign of deception of the ECHR. Before filing the complaint, “Golden Mandarin” lost a court order that obligated “Kievenergo” to return funds for fuel oil. Having gone to court, “Golden Mandarin” received its duplicate. And although an appeal subsequently overturned the extradition decision, this did not prevent the defendants from using a semi-legal document to appeal to the ECHR.
In 2014, Logvinsky received a deputy mandate, and people from the management of the Ministry of Justice were included in the scheme. First - the Government Commissioner for ECHR Affairs and First Deputy Minister of Justice Bernatskaya, and then her successor as Commissioner - Babin.
They, according to law enforcement officers, all the time, in collusion with the organizers of the crime, promoted the idea of recognizing the guilt of the state in the ECHR and voluntarily paying 54 million UAH to the Golden Mandarin. And although at that time the debt of Kyivenergo had allegedly decreased to UAH 38 million, the newly appointed Babin nevertheless signed and sent the fateful declaration to the ECHR.
According to data from law enforcement officers, we have the following situation: the ECHR received incomplete information from the “Golden Mandarin”, and persons controlled by Logvinsky in the offices of the Ministry of Justice ensured the “capitulation” of Ukraine in court. On October 20, 2015, the ECHR issued a decision against Ukraine, which indicated the need to implement the 2009 court order.
This created another level of misunderstanding. The investigation claims that Bernatskaya contributed to the incorrect translation of the ECHR decision: instead of paying 38 million UAH, Ukraine actually had to give the entire 54 million UAH to the Golden Mandarin. Thus, the state found itself in an even more disadvantageous position.
Finally, in 2016, the state paid the Golden Mandarin 54 million UAH, which was transferred to the accounts of the previously mentioned Issachar-Zevulon Import-Export LLC (the company to which the right to claim the debt was sold). Then Logvinsky, with the help of accountant Trubchaninova and his assistant Shevkoplyas (Shvets), legalized the funds received through fictitious companies.
NABU is confident: instead of patiently waiting for the debt to be collected from Kyivenergo in the Ukrainian courts, Logvinsky and his henchmen decided to receive money from the state through the ECHR, partially deceiving the court and lobbying their own interests in the Ministry of Justice.
Hand over suspicion to Logvinsky at any cost
The saga of the “Golden Mandarin” did not end there, because in 2020, NABU-SAP announced suspicions to all the defendants, except for one – that same people’s deputy Georgy Logvinsky, who had immunity from his wife, then ECHR judge Anna Yudkovskaya.
Despite the prosecution’s attempts to lift this immunity, it was all in vain - the ECHR refused and exposed previously unknown, stunning facts about the “Golden Mandarin” case.
The European Court indicated that NABU could put pressure on the participants in the trial, and their actions against Logvinsky contradict immunity and risk undermining the integrity of the procedure for lifting immunity by the Court. In addition, the ECHR noted that there are no guarantees that NABU will not use illegally collected evidence against Logvinsky to prove his guilt.
And all because the Bureau allegedly forced lawyer Vladimirskaya to record her conversations with Logvinsky. Therefore, Logvinsky and other defendants filed applications with the ECHR in 2021 alleging Ukraine’s violation of Art. 8 (Right to respect for private and family life), Part 2, Art. 6 (Presumption of innocence), art. 18 (Limits of application of restrictions on rights) of the European Convention.
In addition, Logvinsky complained to the ECHR that NABU began criminal prosecution to worsen his reputation and create a positive image of the National Bureau. And the state, they say, organized an entire media campaign against him, thereby carrying out an attack on his private life.
In the end, Logvinsky was informed of suspicion in absentia. This happened a year later, when his wife resigned as a judge of the ECHR. Now the ex-people's deputy is on the international wanted list, and a preventive measure has been chosen for him for several months, and also in absentia.
So was it a scam?
The case of the “Golden Mandarin” is unique in its unprecedented assertion by law enforcement officers that the ECHR was “misled.” But not everyone thinks so; human rights activists, in particular, opposed it.
The Kharkov Human Rights Group (KhPG) came to the defense of Logvinsky and gave a counter-conclusion regarding the frauds accused of him. The organization believes that the Golden Mandarin’s appeal to the European Court was legitimate, and the Government Commissioner by law had the right to sign the Declaration of a friendly settlement of the dispute. Therefore, KhPG and ex-people’s deputy Mustafa Dzhemilev, immediately after reporting suspicion to Logvinsky, called on NABU to close the criminal proceedings, considering it politically motivated.
Another cornerstone of the case is those same 54 million UAH. Unlike NABU law enforcement officers, the Ministry of Justice does not believe that the payment of funds to the Golden Mandarin took place illegally. Moreover, the Ministry believes that the state, for its part, rightfully recognized the violation of the rights of the “Golden Mandarin”, and also correctly paid the funds in the amount of exactly 54 million UAH, and not 38. They say that this was also profitable, because otherwise Ukraine should have I would like to allocate an additional 150 million UAH from the budget for fines and compensation.
In addition, there is a real chance to return the money back to the Ukrainian treasury. Courts are currently underway to recover UAH 54 million in a recourse claim from the state against Kyivenergo. After all, the state paid for the energy supplier, and after privatization by Rinat Akhmetov, Kyivenergo also went into bankruptcy proceedings with billions of dollars in debt. The Ministry of Justice has already reported on successes in returning to the budget funds probably withdrawn by Logvinsky.
It is interesting that, according to Logvinsky’s defense, during the investigation, law enforcement officers tried, through the Ministry of Justice, to initiate a review of the ECHR decision on the “Golden Mandarin”, but information about this is still classified.
Already at this stage it can be stated that the matter is quite controversial. This was confirmed by the VAKS investigative judge, who chose a preventive measure for the suspect. He stated that there is currently insufficient evidence to confirm that all the defendants, according to NABU and SAP, were in a criminal conspiracy. Therefore, whether the state budget really suffered millions in losses, and whether Logvinsky and the company really misled the ECHR - only a court verdict will determine.
Evidence is still being collected in the case. The whole process dragged on for six years due to the fact that SAP prosecutors stopped criminal proceedings - some of the suspects are abroad, which means it is more difficult to obtain information from there.
