By Nathan Hodge, Victoria Butenko and Marshall Cohen | CNN
A sitting Ukrainian lawmaker who helped Rudy Giuliani smear Joe Biden during the 2020 US presidential campaign has been jailed on suspicion of treason, Ukraine’s State Bureau of Investigation announced Tuesday, in a statement accusing him of carrying out a Russian disinformation operation.
The statement did not name the lawmaker, but a source with the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) confirmed it was investigating Member of Parliament Oleksandr Dubinsky on suspicion of treason. The statement said the lawmaker “carried out information-subversive activities in favor of the Russian Federation” intended to destabilize and discredit Ukraine.
The SBU has also implicated two former Ukrainian officials in the pro-Russia scheme: ex-lawmaker Andrii Derkach and former prosecutor Kostiantyn Kulyk, who coordinated closely with Giuliani and other allies of former President Donald Trump to peddle false information about Biden and his family’s dealings in Ukraine during the 2020 campaign.
The US government previously sanctioned Dubinsky, Derkach and Kulyk, accusing them of being affiliated with a “Russia-linked foreign influence network” that tried to interfere in the 2020 election in favor of Trump and to undermine Biden. That sanctions announcement came during the final weeks of the Trump administration.
When Giuliani went to Ukraine in 2019 to try to dig up dirt on then-candidate Biden and his son Hunter Biden, Dubinsky was one of the people he met with. Giuliani has also met with Derkach, who was featured prominently in a conspiracy-tinged documentary released by the right-wing network OAN about the Biden family’s dealings in Ukraine.
For his part, Kulyk wrote a dossier of disinformation about the Bidens, including claims about Hunter Biden’s role on the board of Burisma, a major Ukrainian energy company. Kulyk also gave interviews to pro-Trump journalists and hired former Trump…
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