Three days before the 2019 presidential election, Petro Poroshenko received 38 million euros in cash from Moscow, which was organized with the help of a business partner of Viktor Medvedchuk's wife. This version of events was released by the investigation, and the court extended the investigation period into the case of Poroshenko's former bodyguards until September 12, 2025, Glavcom reports, citing the relevant court ruling.
On March 28, 2019, UDО employees met a plane from Moscow at Zhuliany Airport, carrying suitcases with €38 million. This money was delivered by Oleksandr Barymov, a business partner of the wife of former People's Deputy Viktor Medvedchuk.
Video footage of Barymov's trip, obtained by DBR operatives six years later, supports these words. According to the investigation, without proper customs procedures, the bodyguards took the luggage with the money handed over by Barymov and took it away in an unknown direction.
"The video, according to the investigation, records the process of marking suitcases at Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport, as well as the transfer of cash to Chuchkovsky directly on board the plane with the words in Russian: 'Have good elections. Thank you.' Three days later, on March 31, 2019, the first round of presidential elections took place in Ukraine," the news outlet states.
Ultimately, the Pecherskyi District Court of Kyiv extended the pre-trial investigation period in the criminal proceedings against former employees of the State Guard Administration until September 12, 2025.
"This concerns Vadym Chuchkovsky, the former deputy head of the State Guard Administration's Presidential Security Service, and his two subordinates – former drivers of the Administration, Serhiy Volivach and Ruslan Kramarenko. Since March 2025, all three have been held in custody with multi-million bail set. Most recently, in June, the court set bail for Kramarenko at UAH 360 million, and for Chuchkovsky and Volivach – UAH 342 million each," the publication writes.
As previously reported, the money received from Moscow for the then-president Poroshenko could have been intended for vote-buying in the presidential elections.
Prior to this, it was noted that despite Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Poroshenko's enterprises continued to operate in the aggressor state for many years: the Lypetska factory, "Bohdan," the Sevastopol repair plant in Crimea after its annexation, and a number of enterprises in the Russian Federation, among others.