Ukrainian businessman Kolomoisky to appeal London Court verdict in PrivatBank lawsuit
Former PrivatBank owner Ihor Kolomoisky, who has been in custody for nearly two years, plans to appeal a ruling by the High Court of London in favor of PrivatBank in its lawsuit against its former owners and affiliated companies.
"The decision of the High Court of London will be appealed. We will overcome all Ukrainian corrupt actors combined – whether from the Poroshenko camp or the Yermak-Zelenskyy camp – truth and justice will be restored," reads an official statement released Wednesday on Facebook by Kolomoisky's press service.
Kolomoisky claims that the Ukrainian authorities, in collusion with the current leadership of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) and the nationalized PrivatBank, imposed unlawful sanctions against him, unconstitutionally stripped him of his Ukrainian citizenship, "raided nearly all of his assets," and unlawfully deprived him of liberty based on unfounded charges.
The former PrivatBank owner asserts that Ukrainian law enforcement agencies – the Security Service of Ukraine and the Bureau of Economic Security (BES) – with the backing of the President's Office, have deprived him of the ability to effectively defend himself in court, including before the High Court in London.
"I did not have sufficient time or resources to pay for legal counsel or to gather evidence," Kolomoisky noted.
He believes the case is politically motivated, intended to divert public attention from domestic issues. He also claimed that back in 2014, he and his allies prevented the establishment of a so-called "Novorossiya" in Eastern and Southern Ukraine.
Kolomoisky further suggested the possibility of corrupt political influence on the UK judiciary by British political leaders.
As previously reported, PrivatBank – nationalized in December 2016 – filed a lawsuit with the High Court of London a year later against its former owners, Kolomoisky and Hennadiy Boholiubov, as well as six British companies allegedly connected to them. The bank successfully secured a worldwide asset freeze order totaling over $2.5 billion.
In response, legal representatives for Kolomoisky and Boholiubov denied all allegations and argued that PrivatBank had failed to demonstrate specific unlawful actions by the former owners under Ukrainian law or any direct causation of the bank's losses.
Final hearings in the High Court began in mid-June 2023 after being delayed due to the war. By then, PrivatBank's claim had grown from its original $1.9 billion to nearly $4.5 billion, with interest accruing at approximately $500,000 per day. The court's global asset freeze remains in effect.
Following the ruling, PrivatBank declared an unequivocal victory. "In today's ruling, the High Court of London found that these two individuals unlawfully misappropriated nearly $2 billion from the bank using a 'highly sophisticated scheme of re-lending, which was operated for the benefit of the individual defendants,'" the bank stated in a press release.
PrivatBank reminded that, at the time of nationalization, it had a capital shortfall of approximately $5.5 billion, which was later covered by the state through recapitalization.
The bank's legal team said the London court ruled that there was no justification for Kolomoisky's refusal to testify based on his detention. He had not provided any evidence that appearing as a witness would jeopardize his defense in the separate criminal proceedings he currently faces in Ukraine.
According to the bank, the judge also concluded that "the documents provided were insufficient in a number of highly important areas, and it is evident that a significant amount of documentation that once existed was either destroyed or concealed." Furthermore, Kolomoisky "deliberately sought to make the disclosure process as painful as possible for the bank, supplying information drip by drip to give the appearance of compliance," and "consciously decided to destroy data that might have been relevant to the proceedings."
PrivatBank is Ukraine's largest state-owned bank, currently serving over 18 million active clients. Its services are used by 70% of Ukrainians. The bank leads the retail banking sector, actively supports small and medium-sized enterprises, and maintains a network of 1,186 branches, 6,850 ATMs, nearly 10,400 self-service terminals, and over 308,000 POS terminals across the country. Its team comprises more than 19,000 employees.