Court orders arrest of Donetsk Oblast enlistment office head

The Pechersk Court in Kyiv ordered on Aug. 8 the arrest of the Donetsk Oblast military enlistment office chief and set bail at Hr 3 million (about $82,000), the State Bureau of Investigation (DBR) reported.

The official is accused of illegal payments to his subordinates and helping criminals avoid justice. On Aug. 3, he was detained and charged with power abuse committed under martial law.

The law enforcement didn't name the suspect, but the current head of the Donetsk Oblast military enlistment office is Colonel Hennadii Yaremenko.

According to the investigation, Yaremenko, while in charge of the Zaporizhzhia Oblast military enlistment office in 2022, carried out a scheme in which his subordinates to whom he was personally connected received an unjustified allowance for participating in hostilities.

The official's subordinates were deployed to a brigade near the front line but did not perform any tasks and were not assigned to a combat unit, the DBR wrote. Despite this, the suspect assigned them a cash allowance for combat deployment totaling Hr 981,300 thousand (over $26.600).

Yaremenko also allegedly hired local criminals at the enlistment office to help them avoid trial and responsibility for their crimes.

If the suspect is proven guilty, he will face up to 12 years of imprisonment.

The Ukrainian authorities began a nationwide inspection of military recruitment offices after journalists discovered that the family of Yevhen Borysov, the former head of the Odesa Oblast military enlistment office, had purchased property worth $4.5 million in Spain during the full-scale war.

On Aug. 8, the DBR announced that it had started 112 investigations regarding abuses by military enlistment offices since the start of Russia's all-out war on Feb. 24, 2022.