Gennadiy Leonidovich Trukhanov is the mayor of Odessa. He has been named as part of a Ukrainian crime syndicate who laundered money through London by buying multi-million pound properties in the city.
Life
Gennadiy Trukhanov was born on 17 January 1965 in Odessa, which was then in the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, a part of the Soviet Union. In 1986, he graduated from the in Odessa. After graduation, he was given the rank of lieutenant. He was an engineer that specialised in repairing and maintaining artillery. From 1986 until 1992, he served in the North Caucasus Military District. He retired from Armed Forces in 1992, after having attained the rank of captain. In 1993, he worked at a private security firm. In 2000, he worked at Lukoil. He started work at the office of Verkhovna Rada, the parliament of Ukraine, in 2004. He was elected to Odessa city council in 2005, and was re-elected in 2006. He served on various committees in the Odessa city council. He was elected to the Verkhovna Rada as a representative of the Party of Regions in 2012. Amidst rising unrest in Ukraine in the aftermath of the 2014 Ukrainian revolution and the violent 2 May clashes in Odessa, he was elected mayor of the city on 25 May 2014. In the 2015 Mayoral election of Odessa Trukhanov was reelected in the first round of the election with 52.9% of the vote. The Panama Papers indicate that Trukhanov is a Russian citizen, despite Ukrainian law banning dual citizenship. Trukhanov denied the allegation. The Panama Papers also show that he has "a substantial business empire in Ukraine through companies registered in the British Virgin Islands", with a suburb of Moscow listed as his place of residence. On 9 April, Eduard Gurwits, ex-mayor of Odessa, affirmed that Trukhanov possesses three foreign passports: two Russian and one Greek. Trukhanov in 2017, through a Russian court, annulled his Russian passport. Trukhanov was detained at Ukraine's Boryspil International Airport on 14 February 2018 suspected of embezzlement of property through abuse of power. In the July 2019 Ukrainian parliamentary election Trukhanov is placed in the top ten of the party list ofOpposition Bloc. But the nationwide list of this party won 3.23% of the votes and thus did not overcame the 5% election barrier keeping Trukhanov out of parliament.
