Odesa Regional State Administration allocated land to a company whose owner is under sanctions of the National Security Council, it is said in hromadske investigation.
In December 2023, President Volodymyr Zelenskyi imposed economic sanctions against a well-known businessman from Dnipro and Cypriot citizen Vadym Ermolayev for his ties to Russia. Sanctions include blocking of assets, prohibition of trade operations, participation in privatization and leasing of state property. However, this did not prevent the Odesa regional government from allocating 6 hectares of land on the border with Romania to Yermolayev's company Potoky.
According to the investigation, sanctions against Yermolayev were imposed on December 23, 2023, and since the beginning of 2024, he was listed as a sanctioned businessman in Ukraine. However, already on February 1, the Potoky company, controlled by Yermolayev, leased 6 hectares of land on the banks of the Danube River for the construction of its own port. The land was leased by the Odesa Regional State Administration for 49 years.
The Potoky company received land for a "multimodal transshipment complex", effectively creating its own miniport, where the same company is a carrier both on land and on water, without transferring cargo to other legal entities. Journalists found that the business continues to work despite the sanctions, and trucks continue to enter the company's warehouses.
As the journalists found out, sanctions against Yermolayev were introduced on the basis of SBU data. The Security Service of Ukraine claims that in 2014, Vadym Yermolayev re-registered his alcohol business in Crimea to front persons and continued to work there, paying taxes to the Russian budget. In 2021, Yermolaev paid 490 million Russian rubles (approximately $6,5 million) to the Russian budget.
At the same time, the head of the Regional State Administration Oleg Kiper has not yet commented on this situation, despite repeated requests from hromadske.
