Pavlo Lazarenko

His father, Ivan Tryfonovych Lazarenko, was born in 1926 in the village of Hnidyn, near Kyiv.

Following Ivan's birth, the family moved to what is now Kherson Oblast, where they worked as farmers.

In 1932, the family Lazarenko family moved again to Karpivka, where Pavlo would be born.

Pavlo's grandfather, Tryfon Lazarenko, joined the Red Army in 1944 and was killed during World War II.

After the war, Ivan established a 560 ha farm in Karpivka, where Pavlo was born.

Pavlo Ivanovych Lazarenko (Павло Іванович Лазаренко; born 23 January 1953) is a Ukrainian convicted criminal, international fugitive, and a former politician who served as Prime Minister of Ukraine from 1996 to 1997.

Born in 1953 to a peasant family in southern Ukraine, Lazarenko was active in agricultural activities before joining politics in the late 1980s.

Pavlo Lazarenko was born in the village of Karpivka (located near Kryvyi Rih) on 23 January 1953 into a family of peasant farmers.

In 1970, Pavlo got a job as a driver in the kolkhoz "Zoria Komunizma" (Dawn of Communism), in Shyroke Raion.

From May 1971 to June 1973, Lazarenko served in the Soviet Army, on the border with Afghanistan.

After his military service, from 1973 to 1978 Lazarenko studied at the Dnipropetrovsk State Agrarian University in the Agronomic Department.

After graduating, Lazarenko was recognised as an agronomist.

From 1978 to 1983, he worked variously as agronomist, chief agronomist, and head of kolkhoz administration in the Kalinin kolkhoz in Novomoskovsk Raion.

In 1984, Lazarenko was appointed a head of agricultural department of Tsarychanka Raion.

From 1985 to 1987 he worked as a Communist Party functionary in Tsarychanka Raion, and from 1987 to 1990, Lazarenko worked for the Communist Party of Dnipropetrovsk Oblast in agricultural production and food industry sectors.

In February 1990, he was elected as head of Agro-Industrial Complex of Dnipropetrovsk Oblast.

In August 1991, shortly following the Declaration of Independence of Ukraine, Lazarenko was chosen as First Deputy Governor of Dnipropetrovsk Oblast.

In March 1992, President of Ukraine Leonid Kravchuk appointed Lazarenko as Governor of Dnipropetrovsk Oblast.

Lazarenko's candidacy was nominated by the council of working groups conference of the Dnipropetrovsk State Agrarian University, whose decision was supported by over 200 groups.

Leonid Kuchma, then a People's Deputy, at that time proposed Valeriy Pustovoitenko, who would also later become Prime Minister.

Lazarenko remained as Governor until June 1994.

Although he sided with incumbent Kravchuk in the 1994 Ukrainian presidential election, he managed to establish close ties with the election winner, Leonid Kuchma.

Originally Governor of Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, Lazarenko was in 1995 made First Vice Prime Minister of Ukraine for energy affairs, placing him in charge of acquiring energy from foreign countries.

At the recommendation of the Prime Minister of Ukraine Yevhen Marchuk, Kuchma appointed Lazarenko the First Vice Prime Minister for Energy Affairs on 5 September 1995.

As the government official in energy affairs, he was charged with a task of negotiating gas supplies with Russia and Turkmenistan.

Already next year in 1996, Ukraine reported no debts to the Russian Gazprom for the first since its independence.

In 1996 Lazarenko became Doctor of Economic Sciences.

On 28 May 1996, Kuchma confirmed Lazarenko as the Prime Minister of Ukraine within the powers stipulated by the existing "Constitutional Agreement".

On 10 July 1996, less than two weeks after adopting a new Constitution of Ukraine, the Verkhovna Rada approved the appointment of Lazarenko as Prime Minister.

On 16 July 1996, Lazarenko survived an attempt on his life when a bomb exploded near his blocked car en route from Kyiv to Boryspil airport.

Lazarenko was involved in a prolonged and bitter struggle for economic domination with the emerging Donetsk Clan, an industrial and political group based in Donetsk and led by Viktor Yanukovych.

Lazarenko has been linked to the deaths of several of his political opponents, though he has repeatedly denied his involvement in any assassinations.

On 3 November 1996, Yevhen Shcherban, a prominent member of the Verkhovna Rada and natural gas executive, was murdered at Donetsk Airport, a few months after the assassination attempt on Lazarenko, which some media sources accused Shcherban of having a role in.

Following his departure from the office of Prime Minister, Lazarenko also allegedly ordered the assassination of Vadym Hetman, an independent People's Deputy who had been active in economic reform efforts.

While in charge of the Cabinet, Lazarenko reportedly exercised control over many lucrative business projects and speculatively charged 50 percent of profits for his patronage.

Less than a year later, he was appointed by President Leonid Kuchma as Prime Minister, serving for just over a year before being replaced by Valeriy Pustovoitenko on 2 July 1997.

Lazarenko's time as Prime Minister and subsequent trials have established him as one of the most corrupt, authoritarian, and unpopular politicians in Ukrainian history.

According to United Nations reports, Lazarenko stole around $200 million from the Ukrainian government.

Following his 1999 flight from Ukraine, Lazarenko fled to the United States, where he was subsequently tried for extortion, money laundering, and wire fraud, and sentenced.

Since 1999, he has been living in exile in the United States due to criminal charges against him in Ukraine.