Chief of the Prosecutor General's Office (PGO) of Ukraine Yuriy Lutsenko on July 11 signed an order to enact organizational changes in the PGO structure and staffing, under which the Special Investigations Department headed by Serhiy Horbatiuk, engaged in the investigation of crimes during the Revolution of Dignity (Maidan events) in 2013-2014, has been disbanded.
The changes in the structure are aimed at splitting the structural units that carry out pre-trial investigation and procedural control of the pre-trial investigations at the PGO, the PGO's media liaison office explained.
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Thus, the order eliminated four independent structural units of the PGO, namely: the Special Investigations Department; the special department investigating economic crimes; the special unit investigating organized crimes; and the office in charge of procedural control of criminal proceedings handled by the special unit investigating organized crimes.
In exchange, the PGO set up a new department of special investigations as an independent structural unit with the "same number of personnel as the structure of the same name at the former Department of Special Investigations."
The office in charge of procedural control of criminal proceedings investigated by the Special Investigations Department was incorporated as a separate unit in the department for procedural control of criminal proceedings within the State Bureau of Investigation (SBI).
In addition, under the order, two new directorates were created within the PGO's Main Investigation Department on the basis of two independent liquidated structural units, namely the directorate for investigation of economic crimes and the directorate for investigation of organized crimes.
As UNIAN reported, Horbatiuk warned on April 20 that the prosecutors from his Special Investigations Department might be subordinated to one of Lutsenko's deputies, which could do harm to the investigation into the Maidan cases.
