Ukraine’s National Anti-Corruption Bureau and a specialized anti-corruption prosecutor’s office named Andriy Yermak, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s former chief of staff, as an official suspect in a major money-laundering investigation, according to an announcement posted on Telegram late Monday. The agencies said Tuesday that Zelenskyy is not under suspicion in the case.
The probe centers on an alleged money-laundering scheme involving 460 million hryvnias, about $10.5 million, the anti-corruption agencies said. Prosecutors characterized the matter as ongoing rather than resolved through formal charges, and their move fell short of charging Yermak, who resigned in November.
Officials said the case has also reached other figures in Ukraine’s national security and diplomacy, including Rustem Umerov, head of the National Security and Defense Council and a key negotiator in U.S.-linked diplomatic efforts, who was questioned and described as a witness. Prosecutors also said former Deputy Prime Minister Oleksii Chernyshov was “implicated,” along with prominent businessman Tymur Mindich, and that the investigation included suspected wrongdoing in Ukraine’s energy sector, the defense industry, and procurement of drones and other military equipment.
Yermak’s position in Zelenskyy’s government had made the announcement especially politically sensitive, the AP report said, noting that he was a trusted confidant and that investigators searched his home in November. Ukraine’s graft investigations have long been viewed as critical for governance credibility at a time when endemic corruption is one of the obstacles Ukraine faces in seeking European Union admission, a process expected to take years.
Zelenskyy made no public comment on the anti-graft agencies’ announcement, and his press officer, Dmytro Lytvyn, said, “The investigation is ongoing, it’s early to draw conclusions.” Yermak’s attorney, Ihor Fomin, called the suspicion notice groundless and denied his client’s involvement in the alleged laundering of 460 million hryvnias through an elite construction project outside Kyiv. Fomin told Ukrainian public broadcaster Suspilne that, “In my view, this entire situation has been provoked by public pressure,” and said a decision on whether to bring formal charges could take months.
The graft investigation unfolded as Ukraine reported continued pressure on the battlefield following a U.S.-brokered ceasefire pause that decreased fighting but did not stop it altogether, ending Monday. Zelenskyy met Tuesday in Kyiv with Alex Karp, CEO of Palantir Technologies, according to a social media post from the Ukrainian leader.
Zelenskyy said the two discussed “directions of technological development both in the context of combat operations and civilian needs,” and on Telegram he framed the interaction as part of cooperation that could be “useful to each other.” Ukraine’s Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov said after the meeting that cooperation with Palantir is giving Ukraine a technological edge in the war, including detailed analysis of air attacks, AI solutions for processing reconnaissance data, and integration of technology into planning for Ukraine’s deep-strike operations on Russian soil.
In addition, Fedorov said Ukraine and Palantir have created a platform for developers to obtain battlefield data to train AI models, with more than 100 companies involved, as part of Ukraine’s effort to accelerate drone-enabled battlefield capabilities. Ukraine’s officials and Western observers have described the deployment of cutting-edge drone technology as helping improve Ukraine’s battlefield position in recent months, even as Russia’s invasion enters its fifth year.
On Tuesday, Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said the country offered to extend a pause in hostilities, but reported that Russia launched over 200 drones against Ukraine overnight, striking civilian infrastructure and killing at least one person and wounding another six. Sybiha said it was “time to strengthen our positions and force Moscow to end the war” and added that Russian President Vladimir Putin “must realize that it will only get worse for him.”
German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius, who visited Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia and Dnipro regions, said he thinks the Ukrainians “really have momentum” and described Russia as being in a phase of weakness. Separately, Russia’s Defense Ministry said it intercepted 30 Ukrainian drones over Russian regions on the border with Ukraine.