No evidence of wrongdoing by Bidens, former Ukraine official says
KYIV, Ukraine — Ukraine’s top law enforcement official repeatedly rebuffed President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer’s demands to investigate Joe Biden and his son, insisting he had seen no evidence of wrongdoing that he could pursue despite Trump’s allegations.
Yuri Lutsenko, a former Ukraine prosecutor general, said he told Rudy Giuliani that he would be happy to cooperate if the FBI or other U.S. authorities began their own investigation of the former vice president and his son Hunter but insisted they had not broken any Ukrainian laws to his knowledge.
Lutsenko, who was fired as prosecutor general in August, said he had urged Giuliani to launch a U.S. inquiry and go to court if he had any evidence but not to use Ukraine to conduct a political vendetta that could affect the U.S. election.
“I said, ‘Let’s put this through prosecutors, not through presidents,’ ” Lutsenko told The Times. “I told him I could not start an investigation just for the interests of an American official.”
The revelations are at the heart of the House impeachment probe into whether Trump improperly delayed congressionally mandated military aid to Ukraine while urging leaders there to help find dirt on his political opponents to boost his 2020 reelection bid.
Lutsenko said he met Giuliani twice and had numerous conversations with him on the phone. He described the former New York mayor as obsessed with possible misconduct by Biden or his son Hunter.
Both Bidens have denied any wrongdoing, and no evidence has emerged to suggest they broke U.S. laws.
Lutsenko said he told Giuliani that Hunter Biden’s position on the board of Ukraine’s largest natural gas company, Burisma Holdings, while his father was involved in steering Obama administration policy toward Ukraine “could be signs of a conflict of interest” but was not illegal.
Lutsenko’s account is controversial since he is believed to have been one of the original promoters behind the unsubstantiated allegations against Biden. He also complained about the former U.S. ambassador to Kyiv, Marie Yovanovitch, who was recalled in May weeks before her tenure was up.
Yovanovitch had pushed Ukraine’s government to more aggressively crack down on corruption.
But the White House considered her insufficiently loyal to Trump and she became a target of conservative critics, including Giuliani.