President Volodymyr Zelenskyy addresses petition to lift Parimatch ban

Volodymyr Zelenskyy, President of Ukraine, has officially responded to a petition created to support lifting the sanctions against Parimatch.

Earlier this year, on 11 March, Parimatch had all B2C operations suspended in the country of Ukraine following an investigation by the Government.

Following the sanctions against Parimatch, Zelenkskyy said: “These are more than 280 companies and 120 people who, through gambling business schemes, worked against Ukraine, withdrew funds from our state and financed various Russian schemes.

“It took some time to prepare the decision. It has been thoroughly worked out and closes schemes worth tens of billions. And it is not the last such decision.”

Authored by Kuropiatnyk Irina Viktorovna, the ‘Lift sanctions against Parimatch’ petition was created in June to try and lift the 50-year ban from Parimatch, which has since garnered over 25,000 signatures.

As such, it has been delivered to Zelenskyy, who has formally responded on the official petition page on the government website.

In his response, Zelenskyy said: “I thank everyone who joined this petition for their active civic position.

“According to part two of Article 19 of the Constitution of Ukraine, bodies of state power and bodies of local self-government, their officials are obliged to act only on the grounds, within the limits of authority and in the manner envisaged by the Constitution and laws of Ukraine.”

After explaining specific laws, he continued: “In view of the above, I appealed to the Prime Minister of Ukraine D.Shmyhal with a proposal to carefully study the issue raised in the text of the petition and, if there are grounds, to take the necessary response measures.

“The author of the electronic petition will be informed about the relevant results by the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine.”