PGO sends appeal of Rada's MPs on use of U.S. funds to Senate

Ukraine's Prosecutor General's Office (PGO) has sent to the U.S. Senate and senator Robert Jones Portman a formal appeal of 50 Rada's MPs regarding the use of funds, which the U.S. allocated for the PGO reform and replacement of its staff.

"The PGO received an official appeal of Ukraine's MPs regarding the use of funds, which were allocated by the U.S. for the staff renewal and reform of Ukraine's PGO system. Additionally, the relevant appeal, signed by 50 Ukraine's MPs, were sent to the U.S. Senate and senator Robert Jones Portman, member of Committee on homeland security and governmental affairs, on the budget, Finance committee, Energy and natural resources committee," the PGO press service said on Thursday.

The PGO said it was obliged to respond appropriately to reports of potentially criminal incidents. The relevant information will immediately be included in the Unified register of pre-trial investigations.

As reported earlier, Ukraine's PGO will investigate the use of the funds, which were allocated by the U.S. and European partners of Ukraine but never reached PGO accounts.

It is expected that senior PGO officials will be questioned in the course of the investigation.

The sums allegedly missing range from $200,000 to $2 million.

Commenting the situation, the U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine said the funds were allocated to partner organizations, not to the PGO directly. He also stressed that the U.S. wanted Ukraine's PGO to actually fight corruption and not resist reforms.