Former Ukrainian Prosecutor General Ruslan Ryaboshapka said in an interview published on Wednesday that he believes he was fired from his position last year for refusing to investigate President Biden’s son Hunter Biden at the request of Rudy Giuliani and former President Trump.
Speaking to BuzzFeed News, Ryaboshapka said a recently published transcript of a phone call between Giuliani and Andriy Yermak, chief of staff to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, was proof that he had been fired for political reasons.
“It reveals an important detail,” Ryaboshapka told BuzzFeed. “Yermak promised Giuliani to open an investigation into Hunter Biden.”
“I didn’t know about the essence of the call. I didn’t know Yermak promised to help Giuliani,” he added.
In February, Time magazine obtained a transcript of a phone call between Giuliani and Yermak in which Giuliani demanded an investigation be opened that would help Trump win a second term in office.
“Let these investigations go forward,” Giuliani said to Yermak. “Get someone to investigate this.”
“Zelensky asked me several times if there are violations of the law in this case started by [former prosecutor general Yuriy] Lutsenko, violations by Hunter Biden,” Ryaboshapka said regarding the requested investigation. “We looked at 15 or 16 cases. We reviewed all of them and didn’t find anything that could be a violation of the law.”
“Mr. Riaboshapka’s statements may be caused by internal political circumstances in Ukraine and have nothing to do with the foreign policy of the state,” Zelensky’s office told BuzzFeed in response to the former prosecutor’s remarks. “The Office of the President is interested in developing a strong system of independent law enforcement agencies in Ukraine.”
Last week, federal authorities raided Giuliani’s apartment as part of an investigation into his dealings with Ukraine and to determine whether he had failed to register as a foreign agent by lobbying the Trump administration on behalf of Ukraine.
Part of the investigation reportedly has to do with the firing of former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, an Obama appointee who was not liked by Zelensky.
Giuliani claimed on Monday that federal prosecutors were attempting to “frame” him by using the Foreign Agents Registration Act.
“They are trying to frame me,” Giuliani said to Fox News. “They are trying to find something they can make into a crime, some technical violation, some mistake I made.”
On Wednesday, the Department of Justice requested that a federal judge appoint an outside lawyer to review the documents obtained in the search of Giuliani’s apartment.