An SBU general, acid for a journalist and protection for call centres: what is known about the new stage of Ukraine's "Carthage" case
Ukraine's anti-corruption agencies reached the SBU leadership: a general detained, detectives threatened with a gun. Who is who in the case and what comes next.
On the morning of November 4, detectives from Ukraine's National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) arrived with search warrants at the homes and offices of senior officials of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU). According to ZN.ua's sources, about 70 searches were carried out across the country. At one of them, NABU said, a senior SBU officer threatened detectives with a firearm and refused to let them in, and the agency's special forces arrived at the scene. By evening, according to Ukrainska Pravda, detectives had detained SBU Major General Serhiy Duka. Acting SBU head Oleksandr Poklad dismissed him and another official named in the case: the head of the unit responsible for fighting corruption inside the service itself.
With that, the "Carthage" case, which in September cost Ukraine's prosecutor general his job, reached one of the country's most closed institutions. NABU has not officially named any suspects. All names below come from Ukrainian media reports, and no court has found any of these people guilty.
What NABU and SAPO said
According to the bureau and the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office (SAPO), the case concerns a criminal organisation of at least 12 people led by a man with several previous convictions. Its members systematically paid bribes to serving senior officials of the SBU, the Prosecutor General's Office and the National Police, and also drew in figures from the criminal underworld. In exchange, investigators say, the officials protected fraudulent call centres that cheated people in Ukraine and other countries, as well as drug sales and the production of counterfeit cigarettes and fake foreign currency.
NABU says it did not stop there. Members are suspected of planned assaults, kidnappings and beatings carried out "in the interests of the organisation". The bureau and prosecutors released audio recordings. According to summaries by the investigative outlet Bihus.Info and Kyiv Post, the suspects discuss throwing acid at journalist Denys Bihus, whose team had investigated the U420 store chain, and harming blogger Ihor Lachenkov. A veteran who refused to cooperate with them was to be doused with acid or beaten with hammers. The reports do not quote the recordings verbatim.
Who is who
Serhiy Duka is a major general and first deputy head of the SBU's Department for the Protection of National Statehood. According to Ukrainska Pravda, it was his guards who pointed weapons at the detectives, and it was he who was then detained. ZN.ua reports that Duka, together with Colonel Kravchuk, oversaw the forceful part of the SBU's operations against NABU detectives and journalists in July 2025.
Anton Kravchuk is a colonel and head of the SBU's Main Directorate of Internal Security, the unit meant to keep the service itself clean. His premises were searched and Poklad dismissed him.
Oleksandr Kovalchuk is first deputy head of Directorate "D" in the same department. He was also searched.
Andriy Osipov, nicknamed "Kryminal", is the man with whom the current wave began, according to media reports. He is already in NABU custody in another case, suspected of extorting $1 million from a Russian citizen to "settle" criminal prosecution and extradition. SBU identity cards and documents were found during searches of his property, and correspondence on his phone led investigators to the generals. ZN.ua reports that Osipov enjoyed the protection of Duka and Kravchuk.
"The Mexican", according to NABU, is a Russian citizen who founded the Khimprom drug cartel and is wanted in both Ukraine and Russia. Ukrainska Pravda identifies him as Yegor Burkin. Investigators link him to the U420 chain, suspected of selling psychotropic substances disguised as souvenirs. Poklad publicly urged him to come to Ukraine and surrender.
How "Carthage" began
The first stage of the case concerned prosecutors rather than the SBU. Investigators say that in mid-2025 Serhiy Kropyva, deputy head of the Prosecutor General's Office international cooperation department (codename "Chancellor"), set up a group of prosecutors and people close to them who took money to protect call centres. On September 5, 2026, NABU and SAPO exposed the scheme; five people were notified of suspicion and Kropyva was arrested. Documented bribes and laundered assets exceeded 89.9 million hryvnias, according to investigators, with money moved through cryptocurrency and invested in property, including at the Bukovel ski resort.
The recordings mentioned a certain "Boss". Ukrainian journalists speculated that this was Prosecutor General Ruslan Kravchenko; NABU did not confirm it and Kravchenko denies any involvement. Even so, two days after the scheme was exposed he announced his resignation, calling it political, left the country on what was described as a business trip, and on September 15 parliament dismissed him. He has not been notified of suspicion. On October 22, Ivan Tymoshenko, former head of the prosecutor general's IT department, was notified of suspicion; NABU says he handled the logistics of the bribes. From abroad, Kravchenko called the searches at the SBU "political revenge".
A war between agencies
The latest searches continue a conflict that broke into the open in the summer of 2025. On July 21, 2025, the SBU and the Prosecutor General's Office carried out about 70 searches of NABU employees and announced they had "exposed a Russian influence scheme"; two bureau employees were notified of suspicion of treason. NABU said the searches were conducted without court orders. The next day parliament passed law No. 12414 by 263 votes, placing the anti-corruption bureau and prosecutors under the prosecutor general, and Volodymyr Zelensky signed it the same evening. After protests in Ukrainian cities and concern from the European Commission, parliament had to restore the agencies' independence at the end of July.
Now the roles are reversed. People whom journalists describe as executors of last year's attack on NABU have themselves become subjects of an anti-corruption investigation. And the call-centre story has gone, in two months, from prosecutors to a prosecutor general who left the country and to SBU leaders whose unit was supposed to catch corruption inside the service.
What comes next
No official notices of suspicion naming Duka, Kravchuk or Kovalchuk, no charges and no bribe amounts for this episode have yet been published. The High Anti-Corruption Court is due to decide on a pre-trial measure for the general. The SBU said it is assisting the investigation and expects a "transparent, objective and impartial" inquiry; the National Police suspended its officers named in the case pending an internal review.
The scandal comes at an awkward moment for Kyiv. Talks between Russia, Ukraine and the US are due in Abu Dhabi on November 10–11. The European Union, according to Politico, is preparing a more cautious roadmap for Ukraine's accession talks, with no specific date. And Western financial aid, including the EU's €50 billion Ukraine Facility, is tied to reforms that include fighting corruption and the independence of law enforcement. A case in which the security service points guns at anti-corruption detectives and the prosecutor general leaves the country gives ammunition to those in Europe who urge caution on Ukraine's integration and tighter scrutiny of where the money goes. For Kyiv's partners, the main question is no longer individual names but whether Ukraine's system will carry the case through to verdicts or let it turn into another war between agencies.
Sources
Most sources are in Russian.
- Apostrophe: NABU exposes a new criminal organisation in the Carthage case (in Russian)
- 24 Kanal: NABU detains SBU general Serhiy Duka (in Ukrainian)
- Liga.net: Poklad dismisses senior SBU officials named in the anti-corruption case (in Russian)
- ZN.ua: 70 searches, Osipov and SBU generals (in Ukrainian)
- Kyiv Post: NABU tapes reveal plot to attack journalist Denys Bihus
- UNIAN: law enforcers were paid to let fraudulent call centres operate (in Russian)
- Forbes.ua: NABU alleges bribes to the SBU, police and prosecutors to protect call centres (in Russian)
- SecurityLab: "Chancellor", "Boss" and hundreds of call centres (September 10, 2026; in Russian)
- Telegraf: parliament and Zelensky strip NABU and SAPO of independence (July 22, 2025; in Russian)
- Censor.net: parliament to meet on July 31 to restore NABU and SAPO independence (2025; in Russian)
- Interfax: overnight news of November 4, including the EU roadmap for Ukraine reported by Politico (in Russian)
Kurs Media editorial team. Corrections and statements from the parties: press@kursmedia.com. Read in Russian.
