The former deputy head of the administration of former President Viktor Yanukovych, Andriy Portnov, has been shot dead in Spain, local mass media and international news agencies have quoted sources as saying.
Since December 2021, Andriy Portnov has been under US sanctions due to his influence on the courts.
In June 2023, the secretary of the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine Oleksiy Danilov said that the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine had not received a submission on imposing sanctions against Andriy Portnov, former first deputy head of the Presidential Administration under Viktor Yanukovych.
Portnov was in charge of the pro-Russian TV channel NewsOne from 27 August to 5 October 2018. Internews Ukraine’s UkraineWorld project found in its 2020 research that Portnov actively tried to discredit Ukraine’s Revolution of Dignity and further pro-European reforms in the country, as well as promote anti-Western agendas by engaging internet bots.
In March 2022, Scheme journalists established that Portnov’s family owned property in Moscow together with friends of Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, and also showed Portnov’s secret fortress near Kiev. Portnov has not responded to enquiries from Scheme journalists since 22 February 2022.
According to journalists of the Scheme programme, Andriy Portnov left Ukraine on 3 June 2022.