Ukraine's ex-president under investigation over trip to Maldives

Ukraine’s State Investigation Bureau (SIB) has opened a case against its former President Petro Poroshenko, for allegedly traveling to Maldives illegally.

He is being probed over a possible illegal crossing of the state border, for traveling to Maldives on a “false passport" during his presidency.

As per reports, Poroshenko is to have traveled to the Maldives in January 2018 with 10 members of his family. He is to have spent over $500,000 for the seven-day stay, and had traveled to the archipelago nation via Turkish Airlines.

SIB’s investigation shows that the border guard and customs officers “inserted knowingly forged information to allow Poroshenko to cross the border freely.” The criminal case was opened due to the “forgery by the official, illegal trafficking of people through the state border of Ukraine and use of the knowingly forged document.”

While Poroshenko’s illegal border crossing was reported by journalists through an investigative report in 2018, he is to have visited Cheval Blanc Randheli as a “Petro Incognito” and used cash.

Following this, Poroshenko’s press service said that he had made a private trip to the Maldives “for the purpose of a short vacation” and that “he paid for this trip with his own, declared funds, which will be reflected in his electronic declaration.”

While authorities have launched this investigation, Poroshenko maintains that he crossed the border under his own name and passport.

He has also since declared the amount he had spent during the trip, which he says was two times less than journalists had reported.

Petro Poroshenko was the fifth president of Ukraine, and served from 2014-2019.