13 Dec 2019 20:07

Panamanian court closes case against Poroshenko on possible legalization of proceeds - lawyer

KYIV. Dec 13 (Interfax) - Judge Elkis Martinez of the 1st Judicial Circuit in Panama has completely closed the case initiated by former deputy head of the Ukrainian presidential office Andriy Portnov against former President Petro Poroshenko, lawyer Ilya Novikov said.

"Panamanian justice bodies have demonstrated a good working speed and transparency, and the State Bureau of Investigations and some Ukrainian courts look not that appealingly against this background," Novikov said in commenting on the decision on his Facebook account.

It had been reported earlier that a special organized crime prosecutor's office in Panama decided in October to provisionally close the case due to a lack of corpus delicti. "The court closed the case in response to our petition. The judge said there was no corpus delicti indeed and upheld a prosecutor's decision, saying that the case was closed definitively," Novikov said.

Simultaneously, Poroshenko's lawyers filed a perjury motion against Portnov, and the prosecutor in charge of processing the motion acknowledged that Poroshenko suffered from Portnov's perjury and assigned him relevant status, Novikov said.

Panamanian authorities opened a case against Poroshenko based on Portnov's report in July 2019. Portnov alleged in his report that companies linked to Poroshenko legalized criminal proceeds.

Portnov's testimony was attached to his report. After verifying the information provided by Portnov, a Panamanian prosecutor decided to close the case due to the absence of evidence.