Kyiv City Council Members Suspected of Evading Military Service

The State Bureau of Investigation (DBR) has issued suspicions of military service evasion to three Kyiv City Council members, as reported by the press service of the Prosecutor General’s Office on Tuesday, August 1.

Although the DBR has not revealed the names of the suspects, an informant in law enforcement agencies, as reported by LIGA.net, identified the deputies as Ihor Khatsevich and Oleg Levchenko from the European Solidarity party, and Mykhailo Terentyev from the UDAR party.

According to the investigation, three of the council members, who are among four servicemen from a military unit, allegedly failed to report for military service for an entire year. In addition to the council members, one of the figures involved is an assistant to a Kyiv City Council member.

The State Bureau of Investigation reports that the suspects received official business trips to the Kyiv Military State Administration while simultaneously receiving financial support from the military unit where they were expected to serve. The process of determining the appropriate preventive measures for the accused is currently underway.

Background of the suspected council members:

Ihor Khatsevich was elected to the Kyiv City Council on October 25, 2020. He currently serves as the secretary of Kyiv City Council commissions on local self-government, regional and international relations, and assessment of corruption risks in the City Council’s activities.

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Khatsevich has been a member of the European Solidarity Party since 2014, formerly known as the Petro Poroshenko Bloc Solidarity Party.

Oleg Levchenko served as the head of the Baryshiv district state administration in the Kyiv region before being elected as a member of the Kyiv City Council in 2020. He had held the position since 2017.

According to the Kyiv Vlada publication, Levchenko declared significant assets in 2017, including Hr. 2,035,100 at home, along with $36,500 in US cash currency and €28,000 in cash euros (worth $ 30,700). He only had Hr. 152 in the bank. Levchenko’s official income for 2017 was a little over Hr. 4,000 from LLC Kyiv-Center and about Hr. 7,000 as the head of the district administration.

Mykhailo Terentyev is the head of the Kyiv City Council Commission on Architecture, Urban Planning, and Land Relations. He ran for People’s Deputies in the 2019 elections from European Solidarity in Kyiv and competed in 221 districts, taking third place with less than 17 percent of the vote.

Terentyev was among the top ten majoritarian candidates in terms of the size of the electoral fund, ranking ninth. During his parliamentary campaign, he spent Hr. 2.4 million on television advertising, which aired on Inter, 112 Ukraine, and NewsOne channels.

In 2016, during the first 100 days of the newly elected Kyiv City Council work, Mykhailo Terentyev was reportedly absent from most proceedings.