Austrian police detain key figure in Estonian NGO embezzlement case
Austrian police detained Hennady Vaskiv in late March for his suspected role embezzling donations from Estonian NGO Slava Ukraini, formerly headed by Johanna-Maria Lehtme. He now awaits extradition to Ukraine.
"It turns out that in the last days of March, Interpol detained Vaskiv in Austria after he arrived there from the United States," wrote Ilmar Raag, liquidator of Slava Ukraini, on social media.
"Lviv's Frankivsk District Court, where the criminal trial of Vaskiv is taking place, is also involved in the official request to extradite him to Ukraine," Raag added, referring to Ukrainian court registers.
A decision can be found in the register referring to preparations for extraditing a person from Austria.
Raag said although the decision does not name individuals, he knows it concerns Vaskiv because he has been communicating with the Ukrainian prosecutor's office on the matter.
The criminal case was opened on the exact day Raag filed a criminal complaint in Ukraine on behalf of Slava Ukraini.
According to Raag, serious charges are involved, including economic crimes and the legalization of property obtained through criminal means, or money laundering.
"Among other things, Vaskiv is accused of money laundering, which is exactly the term he is said to have used when telling his team at the end of January 2023 that 'Ilmar is accusing Johanna and the Ukrainian team of money laundering,'" Raag noted.
"In reality, at that time I had no idea this could involve money laundering. I was pointing to much smaller issues, and our team did not yet have concrete evidence of the actual criminal scheme. That is why the use of the term 'money laundering' surprised me then. Now it turns out that at least Vaskiv may already have had a clear understanding at that moment of which section of the law his activities fell under," Raag added.
"It is also interesting why Vaskiv returned from the United States. Allegedly, this was due to a lure operation by Ukraine's State Bureau of Investigation, in which an Austrian supposedly promised Vaskiv a job. I don't know the exact details, but in any case, it is clear that Ukraine's State Bureau of Investigation has taken this matter seriously," Raag wrote.
In addition to criminal proceedings, Estonian NGO Slava Ukraini has filed a civil lawsuit to recover material damages caused by former Executive Director Lehtme and Ukrainian partners, along with a separate lawsuit for reputational damage, totaling approximately €750,000.
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Editor: Huko Aaspõllu, Argo Ideon
