Prosecutor General claims Saakashvili received $500,000 from fugitive Kurchenko

Prosecutor General claims Saakashvili received $500,000 from fugitive Kurchenko

Head of Ukraine's Prosecutor General's Office Yuriy Lutsenko has said investigators are in possession of an audio recording of a conversation between ex-president of Georgia, leader of the New Forces Movement party, Mikheil Saakashvili, and ex Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych crony Serhiy Kurchenko, [who fled to Russia after the Revolution of Dignity in early 2014].

In the snippet published by the PGO's office a person with a voice similar to Kurchenko's can be heard talking with a person purported to be Saakashvili about "interests" in Ukraine. The person asks whether he can send a person to Ukraine to realize those interests.

"It's been determined that he [Dangadze] was driving a car belonging to his female acquaintance in an attempt to leave Ukraine, moving at a high speed from Kyiv toward Russia. He was stopped by prosecutors and later by Security Service members at a police checkpoint near the town of Lubny. Dangadze was detained and questioned, and he was presented with the first notice of suspicion and is going to be presented with the second later today. All suspicions concern [Ukrainian Criminal Code] Article 110 (high treason) and Article 256," Lutsenko said.

The combination of these suspicions gives reasons for the prosecutors to ask a court to authorize Dangadze's arrest, he said.