Ukraine Digest: July 3

Yakiv Smolii spokes softly and didn’t give many interviews during his tenure as National Bank of Ukraine governor since 2017. But when he had enough, deciding to resign on July 1, he went out with a loud warning about the political threats to the independence of the central bank. Smolii said that he and his colleagues had been under tremendous pressure, presumably from President Volodymyr Zelensky and Ihor Kolomoisky, a billionaire oligarch who stiffed Ukrainian taxpayers for the $5.5 billion allegedly embezzled from his PrivatBank before the state took it over. Zelensky says he supports the central bank’s independence; Kolomoisky has denied waging a campaign against Smolii. But most sided with Smolii, who said in a statement: “For a long time, systematic political pressure has been exerted on the National Bank of Ukraine. With my resignation, I seek to warn against other attempts to undermine the institutional foundations of the central bank in Ukraine.” (From left: Ihor Kolomoisky, Volodymyr Zelensky, Yakiv Smolii.)