According to the former prime minister of Ukraine, the New York-based law firm allegedly “whitewashed” the activities of former President Viktor Yanukovych in 2012.
A New York law firm paid $11 million to former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko and her lawyer to avoid prosecution by them. The New York Times reported this on Sunday, citing sources.
According to the newspaper, during an interview with this newspaper in 2018, Tymoshenko said that the New York law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom allegedly “whitewashed the activities of [former Ukrainian President Viktor] Yanukovych and his government” in 2012. She claimed that the said company did it in exchange for a reward, and after an interview with her lawyer, she contacted the New York law firm Reid Collins & Tsai to find out what her chances of suing Skadden were.
The New York Times sources claim that Skadden then paid “$11 million or more” to Tymoshenko and her attorney Sergei Vlasenko to avoid a possible lawsuit on their part. The newspaper claims that the funds went into Tymoshenko and Vlasenko’s accounts through Reid Collins & Tsai. The declarations submitted by Tymoshenko and her lawyer to the Ukrainian authorities allegedly indicate that each of them received $5.5 million at that time, the newspaper wrote. At the same time, the newspaper draws attention to the fact that the documents do not mention the firm Skadden.
Last January, Skadden, which the US authorities accused of violating the US law on foreign agents because of its work for the Ukrainian government, reached an agreement with the US Justice Department. According to this agreement, it registered as a foreign agent retroactively and also paid the U.S. authorities $4.6 million, which it received as payments and expenses while working for Ukraine, the U.S. Department of Justice said.
According to the ministry, the Ukrainian Justice Ministry, with the assistance of the former head of the election headquarters of the current US president, Donald Trump Paul Manafort, who worked for the Ukrainian government as a lobbyist, asked Skadden to compile one of the expert reports in 2012 as part of the trial against Yuliya Tymoshenko. According to the US Justice Department, Manafort then as if asked the company to distribute this document. The firm’s partners then allegedly contacted an American journalist, trying to pass the report on to him for publication.
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