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We investigate corruption, uncover fake news and analyze the news agenda. The BIC is a member of the global network of investigative journalists.

Our journalists are the recipients of the national award “Free Word” from the Association of Journalists of Belarus in 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2022. At "Free Word" 2021 BIC’s team also received first place for Analytics

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We are also members of GIJN (Global Investigative Journalism Network)

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News

06 October 2023

Ukrainian businessman denies connection to persons investigated by BIC and takes legal action

Sergei Semeniuk is now suing the editorial board of Slidstvo.Info and the author of the article, Yanina Korniienko, to defend his personal honour, dignity and business standing.

Sergei Semeniuk, a Ukrainian businessman, filed a lawsuit against Slidstvo.Info journalists. The investigation published by the media accused Semeniuk of being friends and partners with Eduard Apsit, a businessman who holds Russian and Belarusian citizenship. Apsit shared the military cleaning market with Yevgeny Prigozhin, the founder of the Wagner Group, after the annexation of Crimea. While remaining a partner of Apsit, Semeniuk also cleaned strategic facilities in Ukraine, as reported in the article produced by Slidstvo.Info in collaboration with BIC and OCCRP.

Sergei Semeniuk is now suing the editorial board of Slidstvo.Info and the author of the article, Yanina Korniienko, to defend his personal honour, dignity and business standing. He denies any connection between Eduard Apsit and his company. However, the BIC reporters discovered that the Ukrainian national has been in charge of the Facilicom Group of Companies since 2014. Anna Apsit, the daughter of Eduard and Elena Apsits, is the beneficiary of the group. Her parents were listed as the proprietors of the business at various periods until she became the owner in July 2023. [*][*]

Semeniuk and Apsit have been business partners for a long time. The BIC possesses documents indicating that their partnership dates back to at least 2009 and extended until 2019. During this period, the Russian company Flagman Clean - employing Apsit's staff - cleaned barracks in occupied Crimea. In addition, the contract signed by Flagman Clean with the Russian Ministry of Defence contained the phone number and e-mail address of the Russian Facilicom company owned by Apsit. [*][*]

Our Ukrainian colleagues believe that the lawyers of Sergei Semeniuk attempted to control the process of automated assignment of cases to judges. They did this by submitting an application multiple times and withdrawing it until they received a "favourable" judge. The defendant in the civil proceedings, Vladislav Hrindak, also seems dubious, as maintained by Alexander Yarashevich who authored the BIC investigation on Eduard Apsit. According to Slidstvo.Info, Hrindak is an unknown individual to journalists who posted about the investigation of Apsit on an Instagram account that was created a month after the publication. When the post was made, he had 33 followers and two posts. It is also concerning that there was a request to consider the case in absentia. [*][*][*]

The BIC hopes that the Ukrainian authorities prevent the suit from being tampered with and take all necessary steps to safeguard the freedom of speech and the journalists' right to investigate corruption and war crimes independently.

The BIC scrutinised Eduard Apsit and his relatives' operations. Follow the links to read more:

Dirty play in a clean market. How Belarusian cleaners earned tens of millions of euros in Belarus, Russia and Ukraine and why they are being tried in Latvia 

Cleaning reputations. How businessman involved in laundering tens of millions of euros received help from Belarus democratic forces in exchange for donations

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