Christopher Miller reports in RFE/RL that US Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch is leaving her post on May 20, two months ahead of schedule. Although people familiar with the decision gave no reason for Yovanovitch leaving early, it’s not hard to see why.
In March Yovanovitch, a career diplomat who has served under presidents Reagan through Trump, called on Ukraine to fire Nazar Kholodnytskyy, the head of Ukraine’s Special Anticorruption Prosecutor’s Office. Kholodnytskyy has been recorded coaching suspects on how to avoid corruption charges. Ukrainian Prosecutor-General Yuriy Lutsenko counterattacked later that month, charging in an interview by John Solomon in the Hill that Ambassador Yovanovitch gave him a list of people not to prosecute. The US State Dept. vehemently denied the charge.
To sweeten the pot Lutsenko also said that Ukraine would launch a “criminal investigation” into whether Ukrainians attempted help Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. This was repeated by Sean Hannity that evening, and this evidently caught President Trump’s attention. As Melinda Haring wrote in the Washington Post at the time:
Lutsenko’s unfounded allegation is clear retribution for the ambassador’s speech condemning the incumbent government for doing so little to fight corruption. The mechanics of the information operation that [Ukraine president] Poroshenko’s minions pulled off are obvious. Lutsenko used Solomon to get to Hannity to get to Trump, whose Twitter feed set thousands chattering about nonexistent collusion. The ensuing blather threatens to derail rational discussion, defame diplomats who are doing their job and distract us from far more important matters.
Western experts say that Ukraine’s corruption is a significant obstacle to Ukraine’s efforts to escape Russian influence, according to a March report by RFE/RL. The corruption is endemic and reaches high levels of Ukraine’s government. But evidently Trump is a fan. After all, from Trump’s point of view, more corruption and more Russian influence is a twofer.