UKRAINIAN OLIGARCH GRANTED SERBIAN CITIZENSHIP WHILE ON THE RUN: The MUP claims that “national interest” was the deciding factor!

Ukraine is unsuccessfully trying to find the former tycoon Petro Dyminsky, due to his involvement in a traffic accident in which a woman died in 2017. Although his address is unknown, it is known that he bought a “golden visa” in Greece, received citizenship from Serbia, and that the export of Serbian weapons to Uganda goes through a Cypriot company that is connected to his wife and daughters. The basis for obtaining citizenship, according to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, was the Serbian “national interest”.

The Ukrainian Petro Dyminsky has been seen in several European countries this year, but it is still unknown where he lives. The Ukrainian authorities are still looking for him due to a traffic accident in 2018 in which a woman died. Photos from the scene show Dyminsky at the scene, but it has still not been confirmed that he was behind the wheel of the Mercedes that caused the accident.

Four days after the fatal accident, Dyminsky left the country in a private plane, and two months later he bought a duplex in a suburb of Athens for 280,000 euros, which was the basis for obtaining a Greek “golden visa”. With this, Dyminsky secured a residence permit in Greece and the possibility of free movement through the Schengen zone countries.

According to official data, he renewed the visa in November 2022 and left Greece the same day. Whether he ever returned – is not known, and journalists found an empty building under construction at the address of the apartment in Athens.

The Greek ministry and police refused to comment on this case. Dyminsky himself did not respond to the questions of OCCRP journalists sent to his daughter and lawyer.

However, it is known that shortly after buying the apartment in Greece, Dyminsky secured a Serbian passport in November 2017. Three years later, his wife Olena also received Serbian citizenship. On the day the document was issued, she flew to Belgrade from Athens, and returned a short time later, according to border police data that journalists had access to.

The Ministry of Internal Affairs told KRIK journalists that Dyminsky was given citizenship because such a decision was “in the interest of the state.” What kind of interests these are was not explained.

KRIK revealed earlier this year that as many as 204 Russian citizens received Serbian citizenship outside of standard procedures and with a special government decision stating that it was “in the national interest.” Among them are people connected with the Federal Security Service (FSB), war profiteers in Ukraine, as well as oligarchs whose companies are under sanctions, and who in this way managed to bypass the travel restrictions imposed on them by the European Union.

Dyminsky manages to move easily around Europe and start life anew thanks to the fact that an international warrant has not been issued for him. In 2018, Interpol canceled the blue warrant, and then rejected Ukraine’s request to issue a red one. The last time Kyiv was rejected was in 2023. Both Interpol and the Ukrainian authorities refused to say why.

Connections with arms exports from

KRIK journalists discovered that a passport is not the only thing that connects Dyminsky with Serbia. Namely, a company owned by his wife lent millions of euros to companies connected with the export of Serbian weapons.

In June 2019, Dyminsky sold his TV station ZIK TV to Taras Kozak, a former Ukrainian MP whom Kyiv accused of being pro-Russian. The Ukrainian authorities banned the television in 2021 on charges of spreading pro-Russian propaganda.

Although the price at which the television was sold was not published at the time, company data show that the sale was carried out through the Cypriot company Ablemark Limited for 27.4 million dollars. Ablemark Limited was controlled by Dyminsky’s wife and daughters at the time.

Soon, Ablemark began lending millions of euros to various companies, including one that later received a license from the Serbian authorities to export weapons from Serbia.

In February 2020, Ablemark gave an interest-free loan to the Cypriot company Jikinto Limited, which in April of the same year received the first of several licenses to export weapons from Serbia. As KRIK announced, Jikinto exported Serbian weapons worth 10.3 million euros to Uganda that year.

Leaked data show that in November 2020, 1.6 million euros of the loan were returned to Ablemark, but it is not known whether the rest was returned.

Before leaving Ukraine, Dyminsky was a typical oligarch, KRIK states. He owned a football club in Lviv, had a television station, and for several years he was also a member of the Ukrainian parliament.

With a fortune of 103 million dollars, he was 44th on Forbes’ list of the richest Ukrainians in 2016.