Palatnyi Artur Leonidovych
Artur Leonidovych Palatnyi is the chairman of the CEC of the political party “Vitali Klitschko’s UDAR”, the right hand and godfather of Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko and the “lord” of the capital’s criminal schemes.
Biography
Born on July 15, 1973 in Kyiv.
Graduated from Pereyaslav-Khmelnytskyi H. Skovoroda National University with a degree in physical education. He holds a PhD in physical education and sports.
He began his political career in 2010, as a member of the Kyiv Regional Council until 2012.
In 2012, he became a Member of Parliament of the VII convocation from the UDAR party and Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Family, Youth Policy, Sports and Tourism.
At first, he was a deputy and later (since 2021) the head of the faction of Vitali Klitschko’s UDAR party.
From 2014 to August 2019, he was a Member of Parliament of Ukraine of the VIII convocation, a member of the Petro Poroshenko Bloc faction, and Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Family, Youth Policy, Sports and Tourism.
Palatnyi has particularly close ties with Vitali Klitschko, and is in fact his right-hand man.
They are also united by family ties, as Palatnyi is a godfather to Vitali and Wladimir Klitschko (the former baptized his eldest son and the latter his youngest daughter).
Arthur has his own hobby: the politician is a big fan of boxing, oddly enough, and holds the position of vice president of the Kyiv Boxing Federation. However, we all know that Palatnyi’s main hobby is to clean up and embezzle the capital’s budget funds.
The main areas of his earnings, which we have repeatedly described in our investigations, are misappropriation of budget funds, including through fraud in the areas of ritual, car evacuation, communal and transport sectors of Kyiv, and the “cherry on top” – protection of brothels.
Former MP Palatnyi periodically tries to convince the public that there is no criminal component to his life, shifting the focus to the mistakes of his youth and active civic position.
However, in reality, Palatnyi has long been called : “the watchdog” for all illegal business in the capital. Brothels, casinos – Mr. Arthur watches over everything and even more, freeing Klitschko’s friend from having to deal with street dirt.
First things first.
Embezzlement of funds in the construction and reconstruction of Kyiv.
Artur Palatnyi is closely connected with Denys Komarnytskyi, the “overseer” of the capital’s construction mafia.
It is at the suggestion of Artur and his godfather that Komarnytskyi’s controlled companies win millions of dollars in tenders related to the reconstruction of the country. For example, Eco-Bud-Trade won a tender for the construction of the Podil Bridge in Kyiv. Budget funds are allocated on a huge scale, but Kyiv residents have not seen the bridge in 6 years of construction.
How much money was spent?
In July 2020, it was reported that Eco-Bud-Trade had spent UAH 9.809 billion on the construction, and as of January 1, 2022, this figure had increased to UAH 12.8 billion. In February 2023, the Kyiv City Council made the first changes to the city budget, which allocated UAH 695.6 million for the completion of the bridge, of which UAH 256.4 million came as a subvention from the state budget. We believe that a significant portion of the funds ended up in the pockets of Mr. Klitschko’s right-hand man, Palatnyi. For more details about the criminal scheme, see the video.
On October 02, 2023, we filed a corresponding application to law enforcement and other competent authorities based on these facts, which resulted in more than one pre-trial investigation. For example, pursuant to the decision of the Darnytsia District Court of Kyiv No. 753/20781/23, the Darnytsia Police Department of the Main Department of the National Police in Kyiv on 12.12.2023 entered information into the URPI under No. 12023100020004964 under Part 4 of Art. 191 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.
Embezzlement of funds in the Kyiv subway
The pavilions of the Demiivsky market have collapsed, and the asphalt near the metro is simply sinking. 70% of the network is in a state of emergency, so Kyiv residents are already anticipating future breakthroughs. What about the blue line?
On December 12, Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko urgently submitted a draft decision “On Approval of the City Target Program for the Development of Kyiv Transport Infrastructure for 2024-2025” for consideration at the next plenary session of the Kyiv City Council. This document envisages a wide range of expenditures for Kyiv Metro.
The first one that stands out the most is the allocation of funds in the amount of more than a billion for the construction of a subway line leading to the Vynohradar residential area. UAH 4 billion has already been stolen on the extension of the Kyiv subway in this very place. However, in fact, absolutely no concrete work has been done. Given this, there will be a risk of losing another almost 1.5 billion. Especially given that such funds will be transferred to Kyivmetrobud JSC from the Fuks-Khomutynnyk orbit. Businessmen and politicians of Yanukovych’s time and connections.
In total, the Kyiv Metro will receive a little more than UAH 9.5 billion for various works.
The list of expenses in Klitschko’s decision does not include any related to solving the problem of the accident with the flooding of the blue line of the Kyiv subway!
For more details about the criminal scheme of Palatnyi and Klitschko, see our video.
A complaint was filed with law enforcement, criminal proceedings were opened, but due to Artur Palatnyi’s influence, all this is successfully kept on the shelves, and the competent authorities are completely inactive.
Utility chaos in Kyiv
Palatnyi is involved in the organization of illegal parking lots in Kyiv and illegal car towing. The above is carried out through the Kyivblagoustrii and Kyivtransparkservis municipal enterprises. The criminal scheme is quite simple: first, land plots are secretly allocated for paid parking lots, and then controlled individuals and legal entities receive the right to manage them. As a result, the money ends up with Klitschko and his crony.
In addition, there are much more parking spaces than indicated on the papers, which leads to money laundering, tax evasion and extortion of undue advantage. We see signs of criminal offenses under Part 4 of Article 191, Part 3 of Article 209, Part 3 of Article 212, Part 2 of Article 364, Part 3 of Article 368, Part 3 of Article 369 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine. We filed an application and complaints with the courts. By the decision of the Pechersk District Court of Kyiv No. 757/42462/23-k dated November 17, 2023, the investigating judge satisfied our complaint and ordered to initiate a pre-trial investigation.
Let’s not forget about the illegal evacuation of cars.
The Department of the Kyiv City Council, headed by its management, creates non-competitive conditions for concluding contracts for evacuation to impound lots, so only controlled and affiliated companies enter into these contracts. The business interests of tow truck entrepreneurs are protected to the maximum extent possible, but ordinary citizens are treated only as a means of illegally siphoning off money for their own enrichment.
Palatnyi also controls the ritual mafia.
More than 100 organizations are competing for leadership in the funeral services market in Kyiv region, including: Memory Funeral Home (Malynovskyi), Peter the Great (Landar), Ritual 911 (Palatnyi), Spokhiy Funeral Home (Chekhovych), Skorbota Company (Kucherenko), and Siyivo Funeral Home. In addition, the “elite” Forest Cemetery in Kyiv is controlled by Mykola Mogilnikov.
We found some striking facts, for example, the Alley of Glory of the fallen defenders is located right on the site of a former cesspool and toilet. And Oleksandr Holub, the head of the PKPO Special Combine, together with local officials, created a scheme to extort money from the families of the victims for the allocation of funeral sites at Kyiv cemeteries. The amounts of extortion are shocking: from 3 to 50 thousand US dollars for one place. Of course, Palatnyi was not without huge corruption kickbacks. Watch more.
Official wealth of Artur Palatnyi
It should be noted that the latest information was entered for 2020, so there may be some discrepancies with the current time. Thus, Artur Palatnyi declared a number of land plots in the Kyiv region, 2 residential buildings and several non-residential premises in Kyiv. Interestingly, the owner of this considerable fortune is his wife, Viktoriia. This is a traditional scheme for all officials. In addition, the Palatnykh family boasts a number of luxury watches from the Rolex, Breguet, Jaeger-LeCoultre and Ulysse Nardin collections, none of which were listed for a price.
The list of the Palatnyis’ “Cleopatra’s treasure trove” includes many rings, earrings, bracelets with precious stones; clothes made of natural fur and even a Vertu cell phone.
As for the vehicles, the family owned Mercedes-Benz S 400 4Matic (over UAH 4 million), Toyota Land Cruiser 200 (over UAH 1.8 million), and Mercedes-Benz S 500 4 Matic at the time of filing the declaration. Moreover, Artur Palatnyi uses the latter free of charge with the permission of his father, Leonid.