Seyar Kurshutov’s "Smuggling Office" steals billions of hryvnias from the Ukrainian budget

Seyar Kurshutov’s "Smuggling Office" steals billions of hryvnias from the Ukrainian budget

Seyar Kurshutov is known in Ukraine as the head of the "Smuggling Office" and is responsible for the corrupt collection of multibillion revenues from importers. Without this "watchman" in the Southern region, not a single container or truck with goods can be imported.

The “Smuggling Office” was created following the example of a classic organized crime group: importers are set a "fee" that they must pay for hassle-free customs clearance and import of goods.

For "working" with the Southern region and financial flows, Kurshutov is assisted by smuggler Victor Sherman, and their criminal activities are covered by the fully controlled by Seyar Kurshutov chief of the Odesa customs - Mykhailo Hribanov.

Victor Sherman

Seyar Kurshutov managed to appoint Mykhailo Hribanov as the head of Odesa customs through agreements at that time with the head of the state customs service Maksym Nefedov.

Maksym Nefedov

Let us recall, Seyar Kurshutov is a Crimean Tatar from the city of Saky (Autonomous Republic of Crimea), who lived on the peninsula before 2014 and owned the company "Clear City Plus" involved in a tax evasion case amounting to 3,100,000 UAH. After the annexation of Crimea, Kurshutov left the peninsula and became the "right-hand man" of the MP from PPB Oleksandr Hranovskyi.

Oleksandr Hranovskyi

According to media information, five years ago, when Petro Poroshenko came to power, he placed his "watchmen" over all ministries and departments where "big money circulates".

This also affected Ukrainian customs, where gaining control over "grey schemes" of import and smuggling could channel multi-million-dollar flows of "black cash". Poroshenko entrusted this task to trusted individuals - MP from PPB Oleksandr Hranovskyi and Victor Sherman. Thus, Oleksandr Hranovskyi became responsible for shadow flows at customs, and Seyar Kurshutov his right-hand man and head of the "Smuggling Office" in the Southern region.

Today Petro Poroshenko is no longer president, and Oleksandr Hranovskyi is on the run, but Seyar Kurshutov managed to agree with the new authorities and continues to collect multimillion-dollar tributes from importers.

The fact that Seyar Kurshutov managed to "negotiate" with the Ze team is also indicated by the fact that the doors of his office in the center of Kyiv at 3 Olhynska Street (which is a five-minute walk from Bankova) remain open even during the quarantine.

According to information obtained from our sources in the Presidential Office, “Seyar Kurshutov is personally protected by the Deputy Head of the Presidential Office Andriy Smyrnov.

Andriy Smyrnov

Andriy Smyrnov, formerly a well-known lawyer, is today the unofficial "curator" of the courts instead of Oleksandr Hranovskyi. Most likely, Seyar Kurshutov became Smyrnov’s responsibility inherited from Hranovskyi. To prove his loyalty to the new masters, Seyar Kurshutov allegedly turned over his former boss and all accomplices. The only nuance is that under Hranovskyi’s curation, Seyar Kurshutov had access to customs and smuggling flows throughout the country, whereas the new masters at the Presidential Office left him exclusively the Odesa region.

According to media information, Seyar Kurshutov is also involved in smuggling cocaine that arrives by sea, along the route from South America to the Odesa region. After the sea journey, part of the drug is distributed in Ukraine, while most is transported by road and rail to EU countries. Already at the western border, cocaine is camouflaged in various ways. The main thing is that the "green light" for this is given by Seyar Kurshutov’s Smuggling Office. It is extremely difficult to determine the market scale as we are talking about a prohibited product.

P.S. Due to the actions of Seyar Kurshutov, on 24.04.2020, during an extraordinary meeting of the Cabinet of Ministers, Maksym Nefedov was dismissed from the position of head of customs, and Serhiy Verlanov as head of the fiscal service.

Our journalists continue the investigation into the corrupt connections of Seyar Kurshutov and his new curators from the Presidential Office, and we hope that soon there will be criminal cases about the "schemes" at the customs and tax services.

To be continued...

Ihor Mizrakh, a well-known anti-corruption journalist, was the first to raise the issue of the huge losses faced by the budget of Ukraine due to Seyar Kurshutov’s activities. On his Facebook page, Ihor Mizrakh declared the necessity to break the schemes of Seyar Kurshutov and Oleksandr Hranovskyi at the Odesa customs, especially when the country is combating the consequences of the coronavirus epidemic, and every hryvnia is crucial for the budget. 

Author: Oleh Denysov

Source: telegra.ph