President Trump wants Ukraine to investigate Hunter Biden for “corruption” because he served on the board of directors of a Ukraine energy firm secretly controlled by the country’s energy minister.
Trump has not alleged any specific wrongdoing by either of the Bidens. But he has latched on Hunter Biden’s unseemly financial relationship with a corrupt self-dealing minister.
Daria Kaleniuk, founder of Ukraine’s Anti-Corruption Action Center, told Robert Mackey of The Intercept that Vice President Joe Biden supported efforts to investigate the company in 2012 while his son served on the board of directors. Specifically, Biden pressured the government to fire prosecutor Victor Shokin for not taking corruption seriously.
Mackey:
Among the most prominent cases of official corruption Shokin had failed to pursue was against Yanukovych’s environment and natural resources minister, Mykola Zlochevsky, who had oversight of all Ukrainian energy firms, including the largest independent gas company, Burisma, which he secretly controlled through shell companies in Cyprus. After Zlochevsky was forced from office along with Yanukovych in 2014, his gas company appointed Hunter Biden to its board.. ….
By getting Shokin removed, Biden in fact made it more rather than less likely that the oligarch who employed his son would be subject to prosecution for corruption
So what was Hunter Biden doing working for Zlochevsky? Enter Stage Right, a pro-Trump site, offered a sane explanation in 2015.
While conspiracy theories abound, the general sentiment among industry experts on the ground in Ukraine is that Burisma brought two high-profile Americans with no energy experience on board in an attempt to gain legitimacy given Zlochevsky’s tainted history.
The timing is significant: Biden officially joined the Burisma board right before the UK investigation that led to the asset freeze was announced.
According to Ukrainian analyst Oleg Varfolomeyev, “Ukrainian companies having reputation problems often hire Western managers, but this has does little to improve their profiles locally.”
So Vice President Joe Biden was trying hold Zlochevsky accountable, his son joing his payroll. That doesn’t justify Trump’s demand that the Ukraine government investigate Biden for corruption, but it does show Biden may have trouble explaining his son’s actions when the Ukraine government reopens its investigation of Burisma.
