The High Anti-Corruption Court has granted the extradition request for former PrivatBank head Dubilet
This was revealed during the broadcast of the hearing.
In December 2021, the High Anti-Corruption Court remanded Dubilet in custody in absentia.
However, as he is currently in Israel, it is impossible to enforce this decision without extradition. Ukrainian law enforcement agencies must now submit a request for extradition to the Israeli Ministry of Justice.
The High Anti-Corruption Court also ordered that the State Migration Service be contacted to obtain a statement regarding his citizenship. In 2021, ‘Livyi Bereg’, citing Dubilet’s lawyer, reported that he had been living in Israel since 2017 and holds Israeli citizenship.
Oleksandr Dubilet was chairman of the board of PrivatBank from 1997 until its nationalisation in December 2016. Law enforcement agencies suspect him of involvement in the withdrawal of 8.2 billion hryvnias from PrivatBank prior to its nationalisation.
In total, there are five other defendants in the case:
- Dubilet’s deputies Volodymyr Yatsenko and Lyudmyla Shmalchenko;
- Head of the Interbank Operations Department Nadiya Konopkina;
- Olena Bychykhina, head of the financial management department;
- Natalia Onishchenko, head of the operations department.
This is one of two PrivatBank cases being investigated by Ukrainian anti-corruption authorities. The other concerns the misappropriation of 9.2 billion hryvnias from the bank. It also involves Dubilet, four of the bank’s top managers and its former owner, Ihor Kolomoyskyi, who is described as the ringleader.
Investigators claim that in early 2015, Kolomoyskyi, who was then head of the Dnipropetrovsk Regional State Administration, devised a scheme to illegally obtain PrivatBank’s funds. He wanted to finance an offshore company under his control and increase his stake in the bank.
