(Pavlo Bagmut/ Ukrinform/Future Publishing via Getty Images)Editor’s Note: This is issue 133 of Ukrainian State-Owned Enterprises Weekly The Kyiv Independent is reposting it with permission Ukreximbank appoints three new top executives. On May 23, Ukreximbank reported that its supervisory board had elected Pavel Haskovec and Svitlana Ageeva as new members of the bank’s executive board following a competitive selection Their candidacies must now be approved by National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) Maksym Zemlianyi has been chosen as Chief Operations Officer (COO). He held leadership roles in Ukrainian banks over 20 years and improved their operational resilience during the full-scale military invasion. Zemlianyi has been TAScombank’s deputy CEO since 2016 Svitlana Ageeva was selected as the new CFO. She has 10 years of financial planning and analysis under her belt from European and Ukrainian banks (including Sense Bank Independent supervisory board to be formed at Ukrtatnafta. On May 21, Naftogaz and Ukraine's Defense Ministry – Ukrtatnafta’s shareholders jointly holding 100% of the company’s shares – began the process of establishing a supervisory board According to Naftogaz’s press release the board will include a majority of independent members In SOE Weekly Issue 68 and Zaporizhzhiatransformator (ZTR) were seized “for the needs of the state” and transferred to the Defense Ministry on Nov The seizures were made under the Law on the Transfer or Seizure of Property under Martial Law or State of Emergency which obligates the state to eventually return the seized assets to the owners or give them fair compensation Naftogaz owns 43.05% of Ukrtatnafta The remaining shares were allegedly divided between the so called Privat group associated with tycoons Ihor Kolomoiskyi and Hennadiy Boholyubov According to Naftogaz, the Defense Ministry now manages the shares of Ukrtatnafta that belonged to private owners As we reported in Issue 68 former CEO of WOG gas stations chain Serhiy Koretskyi became the CEO of both Ukrnafta and Ukrtatnafta on Nov As we also reported in Issue 68 as Ukrnafta and Ukrtatnafta’s new shareholder appointed new supervisory boards at these companies on Nov all new board members were appointed as shareholder representatives – with all of them nominated and appointed by one shareholder As we wrote in Issue 122 Ukrnafta’s new supervisory board with independent members was approved on 6 March 2024 Ukrzaliznytsia’s civilian infrastructure in Kharkiv Oblast was shelled by Russians, the company reported on May 23 and six railway workers were non-fatally injured As we reported earlier, Ukrzaliznytsia’s civilian infrastructure in and around Dnipro was also shelled by Russian troops on April 19. See Issue 128 for more detail On May 8, Ukrzaliznytsia’s civilian infrastructure in Kherson was also shelled. See Issue 131 for more detail SASU identifies shortcomings to the tune of Hr 330 million ($8.2 million) at Ukrspyrt; the company is on the verge of bankruptcy. On May 23, the State Audit Service of Ukraine (SASU) reported the findings of Ukrspyrt’s financial audit According to SASU the largest alcohol distillery producer and state monopoly has completely ceased production activities since April 2023 and owes millions to the state budget and other creditors The demonopolization and reform of the alcohol industry began in 2020. The state budget was forecasted to receive about Hr 5 billion ($124 million). The privatization of distilleries was supposed to be completed in 2021 (according to the Program for Reforming and Developing the Alcohol Industry for 2020-2023) Instead, as of April 1, eight of Ukrspyrt’s enterprises remained unprivatized, resulting in Ukrspyrt missing Hr 95.7 million ($2.4 million) of the planned privatization proceeds (the book value of the property that the winner of the auction would have to pay separately), SASU said Ukrspyrt also incurred more than Hr 70 million ($1.7 million) in additional costs to maintain non-operating enterprises and a further of Hr 5.2 million ($128,000) in lost assets This caused the company to fail to repay its overdue debts to the state budget and other creditors by the end of 2023 Yet another loss was due to the late implementation of the decision of the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine (AMCU) by Ukrspyrt’s former management: The company paid a Hr 33 million ($817,000) penalty The total amount of identified deficiencies and violations in the use of property and funds is over Hr 330 million ($8.2 million), SASU summarized SASU also notes that Ukrspyrt’s failure to fulfill its obligations to the state budget and contractors (due to lack of working capital) would result in penalties of Hr 29.3 million ($725,650) and fines of Hr 8.4 million ($208,000) in case the courts decide in favour of the plaintiffs As we wrote in Issue 131 Stanislav Banchuk was appointed as Ukrspyrt’s new acting CEO On March 1, 2024, Vitaliy Koval, head of the State Property Fund of Ukraine (SPFU), wrote that privatization of distilleries was in the home stretch with the Fund planning to privatize 17 more Ukrspyrt facilities in 2024 According to Koval the SPFU had run 115 online auctions of Ukrspyrt assets; 54 auctions resulted in sales The sum of prices went from Hr 1.25 billion ($30.9 million) to Hr 3.01 billion ($74 million) during the auctions As we wrote in January 2022 Issue 63 acting CEO of Ukrspyrt Serhiy Bleskun resigned the Cabinet of Ministers temporarily assigned Vitaliy Zhadobin as the new acting CEO On Nov. 11, 2022, the Cabinet appointed Ivan Kucherenko as Ukrspyrt’s new acting CEO and the company has since been led by various “acting” CEOs SPFU sets the terms and starting price for UMCC’s privatization, next step is up to the Cabinet. On May 23, the SPFU auction commission determined the terms of privatization of United Mining and Chemical Company (UMCC) The starting price is Hr 3.9 billion ($96.6 million) and provide social guarantees for employees The SPFU said that it was preparing to submit a draft decision of the Cabinet of Ministers to approve the terms and starting price for the sale an auction on Prozorro.Sale would be announced Vitaliy Koval, head of the SPFU, said that seven different business groups that were interested in UMCC before the full-scale war have verbally confirmed their interest As we wrote in Issue 33 more than two years ago, the UMCC privatization auction was scheduled to take place on Aug. 31, 2021. Later, in SOE Weekly Issue 41 we reported that the SPFU cancelled that privatization auction The media published a list of participants allegedly interested in UMCC assets Some of them said that the asset was not well prepared for privatization and they did not consider the auction terms fair Others claimed that the starting price was inadequate It was reportedly impossible to estimate the company’s mineral deposits The SPFU’s auction commission set Oct. 29, 2021 as the new auction date, but that auction was also cancelled (see Issue 49 for detail). So was the following auction on Dec. 20, 2021 (see Issue 57 for detail) In Issue 105 we reported that the SPFU changed UMCC’s executive board dismissing first deputy CEO Yaroslava Maksymenko and replacing her with Yegor Perelygin As we reported in Issue 106 the SPFU planned for UMCC to be one of the first large companies to be privatized The starting price would be determined with BDO Corporate Finance the SPFU’s advisor on the privatization of UMCC However, as we wrote in Issue 109 then acting head of the SPFU Oleksandr Fedoryshyn said later in October that the SPFU was going to offer investors to buy UMCC in a single package with Demurinsky Mining and Processing Plant Vitaliy Koval, the newly appointed head of the SPFU, confirmed this later in an interview (see our Issue 117) this suggested that the SPFU’s previously announced plans to privatize UMCC as one of the first targets would be seriously delayed However, the SPFU’s most recent communication suggests that the Fund has discarded the idea of bundling UMCC and Demurinsky in a single lot Parliament prevents bankruptcy claims for Ukrnafta, Ukrtatnafta, Motor Sich, ZTR, and AvtoKrAZ to protect them from former owners. On May 22, the Verkhovna Rada amended the law on critical infrastructure (Draft Law No. 8316) approving a moratorium on bankruptcy of state-owned critical infrastructure objects during martial law plus two years According to one of the authors of the law, MP Oleksandr Fediyenko (Sluha Narodu faction), this will allow the seized Motor Sich a company must meet three criteria at once: As we reported in Issue 114 in 2023 Naftogaz completed taking over all Firtash gas companies As we wrote in Issue 113 the integration of regional gas companies establishes Naftogaz as a monopoly in gas distribution and they should be privatized via public auctions when “the situation allows this” AvtoKrAZ’s total debts as of the end of 2023 are estimated at Hr 12.3 billion (around $304 million) The company’s revenue reached Hr 303.7 million (around $7.5 million) in 2023 The register of critical infrastructure referred to in the law is closed to the public. The State Service for Special Communications and Information Protection (SSSCIP) is in charge of its content and management, Forbes Ukraine also wrote “The ban on courts considering disputes over companies only because they belong to critical infrastructure contradicts the Constitution, according to which the state must protect all property,” Kuznetsov concluded and Zaporizhzhiatransformator (ZTR) were seized “for the needs of the state” and transferred to the Ministry of Defence on Nov The seizures were made under the Law on the Transfer, Forced Alienation, or Seizure of Property under Martial Law or State of Emergency, which obligates the state to eventually return the seized assets to the owners or give them fair compensation. See Issue 68 for more detail Ukrainian SOE Weekly is an independent weekly digest based on a compilation of the most important news related to state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and state-owned banks in Ukraine The contents of this publication are the sole responsibility of the editorial team of the Ukrainian SOE Weekly The SOE Weekly is produced and financed by Andriy Boytsun Communications support is provided and financed by CFC Big Ideas The SOE Weekly is not financed or influenced by any external party Цей веб-сайт зберігає файли cookie на вашому комп'ютері The cause of the fires was careless handling of fire a fire broke out on an area of 400 square meters at the solid waste landfill A similar fire broke out in the Zolotoni district on an area of 300 square meters reports the Main Department of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine in the Cherkasy region on Facebook It is noted that the forces of the 1st and 3rd state fire-rescue units as well as local fire-rescue teams from the villages of Chervona Sloboda were involved in extinguishing the fire in Chervona Sloboda The report said that the second fire in the administrative boundaries of the Novodmitrivsk Territorial Community is being eliminated by the rescuers of the 8th state fire and rescue unit and the equipment of KP "Misky Vodokanal" " The cause of the fires was careless handling of fire Liquidation continues," the press service emphasized landfill fires cause significant damage to the environment and human health a number of dangerous substances and carcinogenic compounds are released into the air Recall, in July 2023 near Rivne, a landfill fire broke out,probably due to the spontaneous ignition of methane landfill gas As previously reported by EcoPolitics, on August 21, the second fire in two days broke out in the Mykolaiv Oblast in the Andriivsky forest tract. Local schools switched to distance learning They once again called on people not to burn deadwood and to protect nature rescuers are forced to extinguish fires not only after enemy shelling They are convinced that it is necessary to change the approach to forestry The use of materials posted on the EcoPolicy media platform is permitted only if the link to the EcoPolicy is provided and for online publications - the placement of a direct hyperlink to the page where the original material is posted The editors may not share the point of view stated in the author's material The advertiser is responsible for the accuracy of information published in promotional materials Головна Сторінка » English stories » The Journalists Have Received the Information About the Telephone Calls of the Occupiers Proving Their Presence in Kyiv Oblast the Russian military called friends and relatives from their Russian numbers These calls were recorded by mobile stations in the settlements and the journalists have received some detailed information about these calls and processed it This allowed them to obtain some additional evidence of the presence of the occupiers in specific settlements servicemen of the scandalous 64th Brigade from Khabarovsk as well as the 37th and 5th Brigades from Buryatia This is stated in a new investigation of Slidstvo.Info – video has English subtitles Slidstvo.Info has received a list of several hundred Russian phone numbers with which someone called mostly Russian numbers as well The calls were made in Kyiv oblast in March at the time when some settlements were seized by occupiers trying to break into Kyiv the journalists have also received the addresses of the mobile base stations near which the calls were made They are located mostly around Kyiv: Bucha district as well as some villages in the north of Kyiv oblast Journalists have also received some information about the owners of these phone numbers and undertook a more thorough search Slidstvo.Info has identified about a dozen Russian servicemen the journalists have identified more than a dozen occupiers from the 64th Brigade whose phone numbers were recorded in the occupied regions of Kyiv oblast in March The 64th Separate Guards Motor Rifle Brigade from Khabarovsk Krai is perhaps the most “famous” among the occupying forces It was this Russian brigade that was notable for its special atrocities in Bucha The Russian occupiers have tortured and shot hundreds of peaceful Ukrainians the Ukrainian prosecutors have announced the first suspicions to ten servicemen from the 64th Brigade According to the lists analyzed by the journalists the servicemen of this brigade were in the following settlements in March: Makariv The Locations of the 64th Separate Guards Motor Rifle Brigade from Khabarovsk Krai a 27-year-old native of Tomsk oblast Maxim Deev his phone number was active in the village of Makariv in Kyiv oblast Another occupant from the 64th Brigade is a 31-year-old Corporal Alexei Korsuntsev He probably made a call on March 15 from the village of Kolonshchyna in Bucha district which according to the Armed Forces of Ukraine is involved in committing the genocide and murders of civilians in Kyiv oblast is the 37th Guards Motor Rifle Brigade from the town of Kyakhta in Buryatia the journalists have identified at least 14 servicemen of this brigade whose phone numbers were «caught» by the base stations in Kyiv and Zhytomyr oblasts (there were also several villages occupied at the beginning of the full-scale invasion) These data allow us to state that the mentioned unit committed war crimes at least in the following settlements: Ivankiv And also in the village of Vysoke in Zhytomyr oblast The Locations of the Russian Military from the 37th Guards Motor Rifle Brigade from Kyakhta in the village of Severynivka of the Bucha district on March 3 the phone of the 39-year-old resident of Buryatia Sergey Usoltsev was used Usoltsev’s Vkontakte account has not been updated for many years Usoltsev published a photo in the pajamas of the Russian Armed Forces with some visible wounds on his face It seems that Usoltsev was wounded during the invasion of Ukraine and is now in hospital regularly posting new photos Another occupier from the 37th Brigade is a 22-year-old Private Bulat Dirbeyev his phone number was recorded by a base station in the village of Lychanka in Bucha district a 30-year-old Sergeant Vladimir Nechayev was probably in the village of Chervona Sloboda It was there that the base station recorded his Russian phone number thanks to the lists of phone numbers received by the journalists Russian media have repeatedly reported on the Russians from the 5th Separate Tank Brigade from the city of Ulan-Ude But so far there was no clear understanding of where they were the journalists managed to establish the phone numbers of at least 14 servicemen from the 5th Separate Tank Brigade who were active in Kyiv and Zhytomyr oblasts as well as the village of Vysoke in Zhytomyr oblast The Locations of the Russian Military from the 5th Separate Tank Brigade from Ulan-Ude the Russian phone number of a 28-year-old Sergeant Mitap Badmayev was caught on March 6 in the village of Lychanka a 29-year-old Junior Sergeant Arsalan Hobrakov Journalists called the phone number that Hobrakov could use after being asked the questions about his stay in Kyiv oblast in March he noted that he had been using this number recently and did not know who Arsalan Hobrakov was The journalists have also tried to contact other people involved in the investigation Slidstvo.Info agency traced the path of the 27-year-old Viktoria uncovering the conditions of her detention in .. who for the first time shared her experience of imprisonment and what is .. The Command of the Ground Forces told Slidstvo.Info that Oscar was captured in Luhansk Oblast and has been ...