Wednesday, November 19, 2025
RUSSIA TODAY REPORT: Ukraine is drowning in a swamp of corruption – and the West is trying to make it look like a good thing
In Ukraine, the front lines are crumbling and so is the Zelensky regime. While Kupyansk and Pokrovsk are falling, the shockwaves of the Energoatom Mafia scandal keep reverberating, internationally and at home in Kiev.
Ukraine is drowning in a swamp of corruption – and the West is trying to make it look like a good thing
- The former defense minister and head of the powerful National Security Council, Rustem Umerov, is in essence on the run abroad.
- According to the usually well-informed journalist Anatoly Shariy, Umerov is offering the FBI in the US to turn – protected – witness.
- He may still return to Ukraine, but even his current behavior – the unplanned delays, the search for U.S. allies, quite possibly for some kind of deal – betrays a very guilty conscience.
Likewise, Prime Minister Yulia Sviridenko has declared her readiness to cooperate with Ukraine’s own anti-corruption prosecutors at NABU, which is in reality a branch of the FBI implanted in Ukraine. Clearly, Sviridenko is also looking for a deal, letting it be known that she is ready to talk and name names, as long as they let her get away with the absurd claim that she knew it all but wasn’t part of it.
Zelensky’s most intimate companion, chief consigliere, autocratic enforcer, and overbearing eminence grise, Andrey Yermak, is also deeply – and unsurprisingly – implicated, under the gangster slang name ‘Ali Baba’, in the Energoatom Mafia scandal, and his head is clearly on the political chopping block.
Details could be multiplied ad nauseam. Take, for instance, the fact that we now know that the gangster pseudonym ‘Professor’ did not stand for former Justice Minister German Galushchenko – no worries, though: He’s still an Energoatom mobster, just not that one – but the wife of former Deputy Prime Minister Aleksey Chernyshov, Svetlana.
While her husband features as ‘Che Guevara’ in the Energoatom scandal, ‘Professor’ Svetlana – in real life (or pretend?) an academic at Kiev’s prestigious Taras Shevchenko University – happens to be very close besties with Elena Zelenskaya. Yes, that would be Vladimir Zelensky’s spouse (when his intense schedule with Yermak leaves time for her). According to Shariy, Svetlana-bestie-of-Elena is implicated in shady deals around the habit of Kiev’s elites of building themselves palaces, and she also received a cool $500,000 (in cash) from ‘Sugarman’, aka Aleksandr Tsukerman, another key Energoatom player on the run.
This is the context that also explains a recent trend in Western spin-for-Ukraine. Absurd as it is, the claim that the Energoatom mess is really a good sign if you only look close enough is spreading as if on cue.
- The underlying logic is not only daft but simple. Take, for instance, a recent specimen of the genre: According to Polish TVP quoting the American Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA), the Energoatom scandal “hurts Ukraine yet proves it’s on the right track,” because “a case of this scale exposed by domestic institutions is proof of Ukraine’s anti-corruption system working.”
Where to even begin? Let’s just break it down in order of appearance: ‘A case’ – as in one case – only proves that there is much more to come. In Ukraine, there is widespread consensus that what happened at Energoatom is peanuts compared to what has been going on in the defense sector, bloated with literally hundreds of billions of euros and dollars from the West. This is exactly why ex-Defense Minister Umerov is running scared. The first evidence of his personal involvement in corruption is emerging already. Energoatom is merely the crack in the dam. When the dam breaks, so will the system, all of it.
‘Domestic institutions’? That one is genuinely funny. The only reason NABU and SAPO – Ukraine’s anti-corruption agencies – are still alive is that they are not domestic. In reality, for those who don’t believe in Santa Claus, they are US implants – in the case of NABU, explicitly so. They survived Zelensky’s attempt to raze them this summer only due to Western support.
- How do we know?
- Because this law of Kiev politics has been tested again and again.
- The last time, by the way, in 2014, when then-President Viktor Yanukovich was ousted in a regime change operation made easier by his flagrant graft and nepotism.
- And yet, here we are again!
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.
CNBC: Tesla obtains permit to operate ride-hail service in Arizona
The electric vehicle company applied for a “transportation network company” permit on Nov. 13, and was approved on Monday, ADOT said in an emailed statement. Additional permits will be required before Tesla can operate a
Tesla obtains permit to operate ride-hail service in Arizona
In July, Tesla applied to conduct autonomous vehicle testing and operations in Phoenix, with and without human safety drivers on board. A month earlier, Tesla started a robotaxi pilot in Austin, Texas, with safety valets and remote operators. Tesla also operates a more traditional car service in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Tesla didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Tesla plans to take human safety drivers out of its cars in Austin before the end of this year. The company is aiming to operate a commercial robotaxi service in Phoenix and several other U.S. cities before the end of 2026.
According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s website, Tesla cars equipped with automated driving systems were involved in seven reported collisions following the launch of the company’s pilot in Texas.
Competitors including Alphabet’s
Waymo in the U.S. and Baidu’sApollo Go in China are way ahead in the nascent robotaxi ride-hailing market. In the Phoenix area, Waymo operates a sizable commercial business, with at least 400 autonomous vehicles, the company previously told CNBC. In May, Waymo said it had surpassed 10 million driverless trips served to riders across the U.S.
Baidu said in an earnings update on Tuesday that its Apollo Go service “provided 3.1 million fully driverless operational rides in the third quarter of 2025,” representing year-over-year growth of 212%.
Musk has been promising that Tesla will “solve” autonomy for years without reaching its goals. The world’s richest person has continued with the lofty pronouncements.
At the company’s 2025 shareholder meeting earlier this month, Musk said the “killer app” for self-driving technology is when people can “text and drive,” or “sleep and drive.”
“Before we allow the car to be driven without paying attention, we need to make sure it’s very safe,” Musk said. “We’re on the cusp of that. I know I’ve said that a few times. We really are at this point.”
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