The lawmakers are suspected of running an illegal vote-rigging scheme<\/p>\n
Dozens of Ukrainian lawmakers have been implicated in vote rigging, the head of the country\u2019s Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor\u2019s Office (SAPO) told the media on Monday.
\nIn late December, the anti-graft agency reported busting a bribery ring in parliament, in the most recent high-profile corruption scandal to shake Ukraine in recent months.
\n\u201cIn total, SAPO has implicated 41 deputies of the ninth convocation of the Verkhovna Rada,\u201d Aleksandr Klimenko said, using the Ukrainian name for the national legislature.
\nOver the past decade, SAPO and its sister agency \u2013 Ukraine\u2019s National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) \u2013 have implicated some 79 former and current Ukrainian lawmakers, he added.
\nAccording to Klimenko, anti-graft agencies uncovered a scheme in which numerous Rada deputies received cash bribes of up to $5,000 for their votes over several years.<\/p>\n
READ MORE: Details of high-level Ukrainian vote-buying probe released<\/p>\n
NABU and SAPO made the announcement with Ukraine still reeling from a massive corruption scandal in the state nuclear operator Energoatom, which implicated Vladimir Zelensky\u2019s long-time associate, Timur Mindich. Two ministers and the Ukrainian leader\u2019s chief of staff Andrey Yermak resigned in the wake of the revelations.<\/p>\n
Read more<\/p>\n
Ex-Zelensky senior staffer charged over $3.3mn energy scam<\/p>\n
Zelensky\u2019s Servant of the People party has held a voting majority in the current, ninth Rada, since it was elected in a snap vote in 2019. However, Zelensky has refused to call parliamentary or presidential elections since, citing martial law amid the Ukraine conflict. Earlier this month, he moved to extend martial law and general mobilization another 90 days, effectively postponing the polls once again.
\nMoscow maintains that Zelensky is an illegitimate leader, as his term expired in May 2024. Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that Zelensky\u2019s status leaves the legality of any peace deal signed with him in doubt.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The lawmakers are suspected of running an illegal vote-rigging scheme Dozens of Ukrainian lawmakers have been implicated in vote rigging, the head of the country\u2019s Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor\u2019s Office (SAPO)…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27406,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27405","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economy","category-environment","category-politics"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27405","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27405"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27405\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/27406"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27405"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27405"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27405"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}