Ukraine's anti-corruption court gives Zakarpattia councillor seven years

Ukraine's High Anti-Corruption Court (HACC) on 6 October sentenced a member of the Zakarpattia regional council to seven years in prison for abuse of influence over a land rezoning and for organising the illegal transport of men across the state border, and his accomplice to five years, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) said in a statement on its official channel. The councillor was found guilty under Part 3 of Article 332 and Part 2 of Article 369-2 of the Criminal Code, and the accomplice under Part 2 of Article 332.

By combining the penalties, the court gave the councillor seven years with a three-year ban on holding posts in state and local government bodies, state and municipal enterprises, institutions and organisations, confiscation of property other than his house and the plot beneath it, and a fine, according to NABU. The accomplice received five years and the same three-year ban. Neither is named.

The case combines two kinds of conduct: selling influence over local government decisions on land, and charging to move men of conscription age across the border outside official checkpoints. NABU and the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office (SAPO) sent the indictment to court on 24 September 2025, according to a NABU release of that date, so the trial took just over a year.

What the court found

According to the statement, the councillor offered to arrange a change in the designated use of land plots. In return he asked for 15 per cent of the authorised capital of the company that was to own the plots and the property complex on them. He promised to agree the necessary decisions with the city mayor, other officials and members of the city council.

That offence came to light during the investigation of a second episode. The councillor offered a citizen a way for men liable for military service to cross the border outside official crossing points, and brought in a person said to have direct influence on the officials concerned, whom NABU's 2025 release identifies as State Border Guard Service staff. The price was €10,000 per person. The councillor also said he could arrange transport from Kyiv to an agreed location and could secure re-entry into Ukraine as well as exit.

The 2025 release adds that an extra €1,000 was asked to deliver a client from Kyiv to Uzhhorod for the crossing, and that the scheme relied on a figure described as having influence over border guards.

What the statements do not say

Neither NABU document names the city, the mayor or the council members whose votes the councillor promised to secure, or the company that was to receive the land. Neither says whether any rezoning decision was adopted, how many men, if any, were moved across the border, or whether money changed hands. The statement does not give the amount of the fine or say whether the verdict has been appealed.

The intermediary said to have influence over border guards is not described as a defendant in the October statement, and neither document says whether any border guard was charged.

The court's wider record

Border-crossing cases have reached the HACC before. In the first half of 2026 a member of parliament and her assistant, exposed for taking a bribe for illegal border crossing, were sentenced to two years in prison, according to NABU and SAPO's results for the period, which count 55 HACC guilty verdicts against 76 people coming into force in those six months. NABU's channel summarised the councillor's verdict as a conviction for land corruption and for the illegal transport of men liable for military service.

The verdict is subject to appeal, and the next step is the expiry of the appeal period, after which the sentence takes legal effect if no appeal is filed.