MOSCOW, April 17 (RIA Novosti) – Ukraine has frozen shares and property belonging to companies owned by the late self-exiled Russian businessman Boris Berezovsky following a request from Russia, Russian Prosecutor General Yury Chaika said in a report on Wednesday.
The Russian oligarch had lived in self-imposed exile in Britain as an avowed Kremlin foe since 2000 until his death on March 23 this year. Russian authorities had launched a dozen cases against him on numerous charges, including fraud, failing to repatriate foreign currency revenues and abuse of office.
In Wednesday’s report to the Federation Council, devoted to the topic of law and order in Russia in 2012, Chaika said that Ukraine has imposed an arrest on “real estate owned by Berezovsky and returned 110 million rubles [$3.5 million] to the government of the Samara Region and [Russian flagship airline] Aeroflot,” who prosecutors allege suffered losses because of the businessman’s criminal activities.
Chaika also reported progress in international legal cooperation over other cases, including the freezing of more than $10 million in Liechtenstein bank accounts owned by former Bank of Moscow chief executive Andrei Borodin. The former banker at Russia's request is on the Interpol wanted list on charges of large-scale fraud involving state funds and also resides in London.
In addition, Chaika says, Switzerland froze bank accounts owned by ex-senator Igor Izmestyev, sentenced in 2010 to life behind bars on terrorism and murder charges.
In total, the Russian Prosecutor General’s office sent 61 requests for international legal assistance on corruption-related criminal cases in 2012.
Russian prosecutors sent 31 extradition requests for people charged with corruption-related offenses last year. Seven of them were approved, three were rejected and the remaining 21 are still under consideration.
