This Article is From Jun 27, 2014

Liechtenstein Freezes $30 Million in Ukraine Assets

Zurich: Liechtenstein said on Friday it had frozen some $30 million in assets linked to ousted Ukrainian leader Viktor Yanukovych and his inner circle and had opened a money laundering probe against them.

The tiny principality had already said on February 28 that it would follow neighbouring Switzerland's lead and freeze assets linked to Yanukovych and his allies shortly after he was ousted from power.

Vaduz had moved to identify and freeze all potential assets linked to Yanukovych, members of the former government and their family members, after Ukraine's new government opened criminal investigations against them.

Liechtenstein said Friday that "in one group of cases, there is an initial suspicion that a criminal offence was committed," and that its public prosecutor had launched a criminal investigation of four suspects.

In all, 27 million Swiss francs ($30 million, 22 million euros) in assets had been frozen, it said in a statement, adding that it was cooperating closely with other countries where suspicious Ukrainian assets may have been stashed, but declining to provide further information.

Switzerland said earlier this month that it had frozen some $190 million in Ukrainian assets.

Those sums however appear to represent just a drop in the bucket.

Increasingly conflict-wracked Ukraine has already identified at least 35 billion Ukrainian hryvnias ($3 billion, 2.1 billion euros) in assets looted under Yanukovych's regime, and Ukraine's general prosecutor Oleh Makhnitskyi told an international conference in April he expected the eventual total to reach tens of billions of dollars.
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