Screening: Bloody Money + Q&A

UPDATE: Unfortunately, on account of legal challenges directed at the Frontline Club, this event will no longer include a screening of Bloody Money as originally advertised. The event will still be going ahead minus the screening – and promises to be a fascinating discussion on the wider issue of corruption in Ukraine, featured three key experts in this field. 

This decision has been taken on receipt of a legal challenge waged by Peters & Peters Solicitors LLP on behalf of former Ukrainian Minister of Ecology Mykola Zlochevskyi, who features prominently in the film. As a small charitable organisation we do not have the resources to enter into a legal battle of this sort.

Please contact the office at [email protected] if you require further information. 

This screening will be followed by a Q&A with presenter and journalist Oliver Bullough; executive director of Ukraine’s Anti-Corruption Action Centre, Daria Kaleniuk; and Shauna Leven, Global Witness’ Campaigns Director on corruption.

In 2014, Western countries made Ukrainians a promise. They pledged to find the money stolen by Ukraine’s deposed president, as well as by his friends and relatives, and to return it. Ukraine was in desperate need of funds, as it sought to repel a Russian invasion, to maintain basic services, to pay its foreign debt, and to end – once and for all – its crippling epidemic of corruption. Two years on, it’s time to ask how that is going.

Bloody Money tells two stories. One is of a Ukrainian oligarch’s bank account – and the $23 million it contained. In unprecedented detail, it reveals where the money came from, how it was laundered, and what happened when a British judge ruled on its provenance. The other story is that of a Ukrainian mother, and her battle to find medicines for her haemophiliac daughter, in a country where healthcare is just one more opportunity for corrupt officials to make money.

Bloody Money reveals how kleptocrats use shell companies to obscure the origins of their stolen money, and how Western enablers – lawyers, accountants, and more – assist them in doing so. It also shows how Ukrainian officials continue to run corrupt schemes, despite 2014’s revolution, and how that is sabotaging the country’s reform efforts.

Directed by award-winning director Havana Marking and presented by award-winning investigative reporter Oliver Bullough, Bloody Money is produced in collaboration with Sundance and Vice News, as part of the prize awarded to Global Witness when it won the 2014 TED Prize.

Director: Havana Marking
Producer: Oliver Bullough
Presenter: Oliver Bullough
Country: United Kingdom
Runtime: 38′
Roast Beef Productions