DOSSIER: Nalivaychenko Valentin Aleksandrovich

Valentin Nalyvaychenko

Biography

Born in Zaporizhzhia. He graduated with honors from Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, with a degree (according to some sources) in philology. He also had a diplomatic career. Information about Nalyvaichenko's activities in the early 1990s is, for some reason, absent from his autobiography. At least, as the newspaper "Segodnya" reported, citing sources in the SBU, in 1994 he was an employee of the Zaporizhzhia-based private enterprise "Kachestvo."

The majority of V. Nalyvaichenko's career has been spent as a diplomat, rising to the rank of Envoy Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary First Class. From 1994 to 1997, he served as Second Secretary and First Secretary of the Ukrainian Embassy in Finland, with concurrent assignments in Denmark and Norway. Then, until May 2001, he served as First Secretary, Counselor, Department Head, and Deputy Head of the Consular Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine. He spent the next two years as Consul General of the Ukrainian Embassy in the United States. From November 2003 to February 2004, he served as Director of the Consular Service Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine. His next post (until February 2006) was as Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine.

During this time, V. Nalyvaichenko served as a member of the Commission on Citizenship under the President of Ukraine and as the head of the Ukrainian delegation in negotiations with the European Commission on the signing of the Readmission Agreement. While still serving as Deputy Minister, on December 30, 2005, by decree of President Viktor Yushchenko, V. Nalyvaichenko was appointed Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine to the Republic of Belarus. He presented his credentials to President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko on March 13, 2006.
Political ambitions
On May 29, 2006, to the surprise of many, the head of state promoted V. Nalyvaichenko to the position of First Deputy Head of the Security Service of Ukraine. Six months later, on December 22, the President dismissed the head of the SBU, Ihor Drizhchany. Even though observers believed Drizhchany had been quite comfortable with the presidential team in August, during the formation of the new Cabinet of Ministers and major personnel changes in other key government bodies, he was considered quite controllable and predictable.

Since I. Drizhchany's resignation, V. Nalyvaichenko has served as acting head of the SBU. During this time, the security service not only performed its usual functions but also found itself embroiled in the political standoff between the President and the ruling coalition consisting of the Party of Regions, the Socialist Party, and the Communist Party of Ukraine. In the first half of 2007, the SBU and Nalyvaichenko's name were repeatedly mentioned in comments by politicians, experts, and media reports, first in the context of the power struggle between V. Yushchenko and Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, then in the context of the escalating political crisis that erupted with the dissolution of the fifth convocation of the Verkhovna Rada.

The SBU leadership was hit by a barrage of accusations from Viktor Yushchenko's opponents and the opposition that the service was serving the interests of the Presidential Secretariat and engaging in political repression. The criticism became particularly vocal after Nalyvaichenko's high-profile statement that his agency had grounds to suspect Constitutional Court judge Susanna Stanyk, who had been appointed rapporteur in the case challenging the constitutionality of the Presidential Decree dissolving parliament, of accepting a large bribe. One of the most vocal critics of the SBU and Nalyvaichenko personally at the time was Volodymyr Sivkovych, a member of the Party of Regions faction. He even suggested that the SBU chief could very well end up behind bars for his statements. "He even has a nickname among his staff now—not Nalyvaichenko, but 'Zalivaichenko,' because his behavior within an institution like the SBU is perceived very negatively," the Party of Regions politician said at the time.

However, V. Sivkovych's prediction did not come true. "At least until the election of a new Verkhovna Rada, all talk of changing the SBU leadership should be regarded as empty chatter, convenient only for its authors," stated Viktor Baloha, Head of the Presidential Secretariat, at a briefing in May 2007. However, V. Nalyvaichenko felt quite comfortable in his position as acting head of the Security Service even a year later. And it was not the Party of Regions or the Communists who periodically accused the SBU of attempted political persecution, but the President's recent allies—members of the People's Self-Defense and the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc. On March 6, 2009, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, by 230 votes, approved V. Nalyvaichenko's appointment as Chairman of the SBU (without the prefix "acting").

Kompromat
Self compromising on politics
The Last "Andropovite," or Who Is This Nalyvaichenko? Last week, the scandalous story of a parliamentary appeal to the Prosecutor General Alexander Medvedko The story about the former acting head of the SBU seems to have reached its logical conclusion.

As a reminder, the issue concerns the MPs' desire to clarify certain aspects of the biography of the current head of the SBU, Valentyn Nalyvaichenko, specifically regarding numerous media reports alleging his concealment of his studies at a KGB special school. The SBU press service, represented by Maryna Ostapenko, responded almost immediately to the MPs' inquiry, hastening to clarify that the acting head of the Security Service of Ukraine, Valentyn Nalyvaichenko, studied not at the Higher School of the USSR State Security Committee, but at the Andropov Intelligence Institute. Furthermore, as it turns out, in an interview back in July with the weekly supplement to the Fakty newspaper, "Events and People," Nalyvaichenko personally, as intelligence officials put it, "revealed" his educational background and "made no attempt to conceal these biographical facts, because he has nothing to be ashamed of."

In that interview, Nalyvaichenko spoke generally about his studies at the Andropov Intelligence Institute, where he earned his second degree. "I was the last student from Ukraine at the Andropov Institute. I had a choice—stay there or go back. I said, 'No, my parents are in Ukraine, I'm going back,'" the current acting head of the SBU said at the time. However, instead of dotting the "i"s, more questions arose. So why, after all, was there no mention of his studies at the SVR's "forest school" in Nalyvaichenko's official biography? Why did Nalyvaichenko make his "confession," which resembles a kind of preemptive maneuver (otherwise it's difficult to assess such a statement, preceded by such a long period of silence), only when the tide of rumors and innuendo about his past began to mount so rapidly, threatening to escalate into something truly dangerous? It should be noted that this was greatly facilitated by numerous internal departmental and political scandals involving the head of the SBU, as a result of which opponents threatened to pour a "bucket of dirt" on Nalyvaichenko from the not-so-distant past, characterizing Nalyvaichenko as a "typical KGB provocateur."

It's more than strange, for example, why, immediately after journalist Dolganov's accusations against Nalyvaichenko, the newspaper Segodnya published the following: "The SBU declined to comment on Vadim Dolganov's statements, but at our request, they recounted the stages of Mr. Nalyvaichenko's biography from 90 to 94." Of course, here, too, there's no mention of what Valentin Aleksandrovich "didn't try to hide because he had nothing to be ashamed of." To clarify the picture, it's worth taking a closer look at what Valentin Nalyvaichenko successfully graduated from the Andropov SVR Academy.

This educational institution's roots date back to the Stalin era, and researchers believe the main reason for its creation was a shortage of professional personnel (primarily caused by the constant, large-scale purges of the intelligence services) for work abroad. This institution underwent several transformations, particularly during the height of the Great Patriotic War and after its conclusion, depending on the immediate needs of intelligence. The "forest school" (as the academy was nicknamed due to its forested location) gained its greatest influence during the height of the Cold War, serving as a training ground for the First Main Directorate of the KGB. Experts often have conflicting opinions about this "training ground." Some call the Andropov Academy an elite university, where top faculty have maintained a high standard for decades, preparing super-professionals for the most important positions abroad. Others see it as a bureaucratic secret service cesspool, where employees unfit for practical work are exiled to the management and teaching ranks due to "failures" or more mundane reasons. Opinions regarding the academy's applicants are equally varied. It's logical to assume that such a career requires remarkable intelligence and extraordinary talent.

However, in an interview with Kommersant-Vlast, one of the PGU veterans asserts the opposite, answering the question: "Didn't everyone who wanted to join the intelligence service take it?": "They didn't take anyone who wanted to. If someone showed initiative, it was met with rejection and questions about why they were doing it, whether they were trying to flee abroad. So the more a candidate resisted recruiters, the higher their chances of getting into PGU. High-brow intellectuals were excluded right from the very first stage of selection. They were considered (and probably not without reason) to be psychologically unstable. Ambitious comrades were also weeded out. Of course, to advance, such a guy would dig deep and achieve good results. But if he decided he wasn't highly regarded, he might resort to intrigue. Therefore, preference was given to solid, middling talent. For those young men who weren't exactly the brightest stars but who appreciated the benefits of intelligence service—a much higher salary than their peers and the opportunity to see the world—they were less likely to make any sudden moves for fear of losing these benefits.

And therefore, they won't cause trouble for the leadership." However, according to the same veteran foreign intelligence officer, there were other options, perhaps closer to the case of the far from incompetent Valentin Nalyvaichenko: "Question: But, judging by the literature, residencies also existed in countries not very convenient for work." "Of course. And they sent wealthy people there—the children of generals, Central Committee officials, and the like. He lived in comfort for five years in Norway, for example, without doing anything. But everyone knows that it's impossible to do anything there. So the person goes to another country that's difficult to work in, but comfortable." Naturally, in this case, the obligatory requirement for the coveted exit to an "inconvenient" capitalist country was knowledge of the language. As we know, Valentin Nalyvaichenko, the son-in-law of the Ukrainian KGB bigwig Mukha, was quite accomplished in learning Finnish. Today, many graduates of the SVR Academy have achieved quite successful careers: in Russia, they even occupy the highest government posts (Vladimir Putin, Sergei Ivanov); many "forest schoolchildren" are also in big business (for example, the leading Russian banker and State Duma deputy Lebedev is proud of his interesting past).

Why did Nalyvaichenko so stubbornly remain silent about his affiliation with the secret service? After all, the mere fact of receiving a diploma from School No. 101 is not a crime, nor is it a career killer (the lustration law had not been passed in Ukraine). At the same time, it's obvious that information about this would have surfaced sooner or later – there were simply too many witnesses. Perhaps the answer lies somewhere in the Andropov Academy, where experts often cite its most vulnerable point: the unjustified concentration of highly classified personnel in one location, where the "exposure" (re-recruitment) of one could cost the careers of nearly all of his colleagues. All this contributed to the development of specific informal connections among intelligence officers; moreover, there is evidence that even at the height of the Cold War, the SVR had its own "influence groups," or "mafias," where intelligence officers with shared interests clustered together. There's no reason to confidently assert that these "networks" were destroyed along with the Soviet Union and the destruction of the combined-cycle power plant. What do they serve now? Business? Politics? In any case, it seems that this issue would also benefit from an investigation by the Ukrainian authorities.

Grigory PETRENKO Regional Committee

Promises and Quotes
08 May 2014
The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) has promised to prevent referendums on independence for the Luhansk and Donetsk regions on May 11. SBU Chief Valentyn Nalyvaichenko announced this at a press conference, according to an RBC-Ukraine correspondent.

"Preparations for the pseudo-referendum have not stopped, but we will do everything to ensure that these pseudo-referendums are not financed and that they are not organized."

March 04 2014
Ukrainian counterintelligence is currently actively searching for spies within the country. Security Service Chief Valentyn Nalyvaichenko announced this at a briefing today.

However, he said this information will only be made public after specific arrests. "Any foreign spies are the work of professional counterintelligence; specialists return," Nalyvaichenko said, according to Interfax.

22 2012 June

All the promises

August 28 2014
It is essential to inform our citizens that the 18th Special Center of the FSB of the Russian Federation operates as a special agency, where nearly 1,5 employees have been deliberately sending panic-mongering messages on social media via automated email and SMS messaging systems for the past three days, 3 hours a day. The goal of these actions is to provoke panic by disseminating false and inaccurate information, which they then use to destabilize the situation.

Commander-in-Chief, July 23, 2014

August 22 2014
We're calling this a direct invasion. Under the cynical guise of the Red Cross, these are military vehicles with covert documents. In recent days, we've witnessed a carefully planned, dangerous, and risky provocation against Ukraine, brazenly and cynically exploiting the esteemed International Committee of the Red Cross—a provocation involving a so-called "humanitarian convoy."

UP, August 22, 2014

July 07 2014
I'm not just confident. They're working and fulfilling their assigned tasks. They've replaced leadership at every level. But those young officers who remained loyal to their oath and passed the lie detector test—they're still working. Everyone who served in the ATO and who moved from Crimea passed the lie detector test.

Interfax-Ukraine, July 7, 2014

Most closely associated with:

Alexander Petrulevich, Alexander Bondaruk, Vitali Klitschko, Alexander Krivich, Anatoliy Polyakh, Vitaliy Naida, Vitaliy Tsyganok, Gennady Grishchenko, Vasily Krutov, Nikolay Naidich, Mikhail Grek, Oleg Kotlyar, Viktor Andreychuk, Andrey Levus, Viktor Gvozd, Vladislav Bukharev, Valery Kondratyuk, Sergey Kurosh, Valery Ivanov, Mikhail Salva, Sergey Shevchenko, Vladimir Krylenko, Roman Semenov, Viktor Yagun, Sergey Ratiev, Alexander Shmitko, Vasily Vovk, Valery Rudnitsky, Vasily Gritsak, Alexander Nekrasov, Sergey Bazyuk, Anatoliy Budovitsky, Nikolay Shvaika, Roman Lubkivsky, Dmytro Yarmak

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