Tainted former Odesa mayor Trukhanov charged with negligence over handling of Odesa floods, media reports
Editor's note: This is a developing story and is being updated.
The controversial former mayor of Odesa, Hennadiy Trukhanov, has been charged with negligence over his handling of a heavy rainstorm and flooding that devastated the coastal city late last month, various Ukrainian media outlets reported on Oct. 28.
Ukrainska Pravda reported, citing its sources, that Trukhanov and seven of his subordinates were charged with negligence for failing to take adequate measures before and during the massive storm that claimed the lives of 10 people, including a child.
Public broadcaster Suspilne reported that searches at the residences of Trukhanov and his subordinates are ongoing.
The Kyiv Independent cannot immediately verify the reports, and no additional details were provided on the reported charges.
Two days of heavy rain caused widespread flooding, power outages, and downed trees across the region at the end of September, with reports of over 360 people rescued amid the storm.
The charges against Trukhanov follow a series of political developments over the past month in Odesa's Mayoral Office.
Trukhanov is a controversial figure in Ukraine due to his alleged Russian citizenship, as well as active charges against him stemming from a corruption case involving Odesa's Krayan factory building.
However, critics have also accused President Volodymyr Zelensky of turning a blind eye to the mayor's Russian citizenship before and trying to remove Trukhanov from office in order to monopolize power and eliminate local autonomy.
On Oct. 14, Zelensky issued a decree to strip Trukhanov of his Ukrainian citizenship, based on evidence that Trukhanov is a Russian citizen — a claim that he has denied.
As evidence, Ukraine's Security Service (SBU) published a purported photo of Trukhanov's active Russian passport, issued in 2015, a year after Russia launched its war against Ukraine and occupied the Crimean Peninsula.
Despite the photo, the Insider, a Russian investigative journalism outlet, claimed on Oct. 15 that while databases confirm that Trukhanov is a Russian citizen, the photo of the Russian passport published by the SBU is doctored.
When asked on Oct. 28 during a closed-door meeting with journalists, Zelensky said while Ukraine's State Border Guard Service has evidence of Trukhanov's Russian citizenship, the legitimacy of the SBU-published passport "doesn’t concern" him.
In an effort to replace Trukhanov, Zelensky appointed Serhii Lysak as head of the the newly formed Odesa Military Administration on Oct. 15. Zelensky's ally Ihor Koval, the secretary of the Odesa city council, a day later appointed himself as the city's acting mayor while Trukhanov was on vacation.
The procedure for depriving people of Ukrainian citizenship through presidential decrees without court decisions has also been lambasted as legally dubious or even illegal.
Kateryna Denisova
