Anticorruption agencies arrest four suspects after government forced to backtrack on push to strip them of autonomy.
Ukrainian authorities have detained several officials over a “large-scale corruption scheme” in the defence sector, just days after lawmakers restored the independence of the country’s two main investigative bodies.
The National Anti-Corruption Agency (NABU) and the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAP) said in a joint statement on Saturday that they made four arrests in connection with the scheme, which involved the procurement of military drones and signal jamming systems.
“The essence of the scheme was to conclude state contracts with supplier companies at deliberately inflated prices,” they said, adding that the suspects had received kickbacks of up to 30 percent of the contract amounts.
NABU and SAPO said they had caught a sitting lawmaker, two local officials and an unspecified number of National Guard personnel taking bribes. The suspects were not identified in Saturday’s statement.
The Ministry of Internal Affairs also said it had suspended the suspected National Guard members.
The announcement comes after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy came under criticism last month for trying to take away the anticorruption agencies’ independence and place them under the control of his prosecutor-general.
The agencies regained their autonomy after Zelenskyy’s move sparked the first antigovernment demonstrations in Ukraine since Russia invaded in 2022.
Zelenskyy, who enjoys far-reaching wartime powers, initially said he needed to bring the agencies under his control because they were inefficient and under “Russian influence”.
But he then said he had heard people’s anger and submitted a bill restoring the agencies’ independence, which was passed by lawmakers on Thursday.
“It is important that anticorruption institutions operate independently, and the law passed on Thursday guarantees them all the tools necessary for a real fight against corruption,” Zelenskyy said.
Ukraine’s European allies praised the about-face, having voiced concerns about the original defanging of the agencies.
Top officials had told Zelenskyy that Ukraine was jeopardising its bid for European Union membership by curbing the powers of its antigraft authorities.
In a statement about Saturday’s arrests, Zelenskyy said he was “grateful to the anti-corruption agencies for their work”.
A travel expert has shed fresh light on what goes on below deck of commercial cruise ships – including what happens when passengers die onboard and the cryptic codes shared on the PA system
Cruise ships are outfitted with jails and morgues to prepare for all types of scenarios(Image: MSC Rights)
Netflix’s new documentary Trainwreck: The Poop Cruise has caused quite the commotion, leaving many curious about the inner workings of mega cruises. One travel expert has the answers, sharing insider secrets of life below deck. Global Work & Travel ’s Jessie Chambers shares five of the most surprising secrets from the cruise world, including onboard jails and morgues.
She also unpacks common codes blasted over the PA system. According to Chambers, most cruise ships have a brig which is essentially a “secure jail-like room” to detain unruly or dangerous passengers. The brig houses these passengers until they can be removed at the next port.
According to Chambers, cruise ships are like “floating cities”(Image: Getty Images)
Cruise ships also have a place to house deceased passengers. Given that some cruises have an older average passenger age, it isn’t altogether uncommon for deaths to occur onboard. For this reason, most cruise liners are equipped with morgues that can hold multiple bodies until the ship reaches land.
In rare cases, families can potentially request burials at sea – a practice that still exists under strict regulation. According to Chambers, some passengers even pre-plan their final voyage, ashes included.
When it comes to the code system used by staff, Chambers explains that these are used to signal emergencies. Cruise staff are trained to use discreet codes (i.e. “Code Oscar” or “Code Alpha”) to flag medical incidents, man overboard alerts, or even biohazard events like mass vomiting.
Chambers’ last insider secret is that not all ports will welcome all passengers, even if they have paid already. She says that if your cruise ship has a health issue onboard or if weather turns, your port stop can be cancelled.
If this happens, passengers can be left with no recourse or compensation. She says this has happened frequently in the post-COVID era.
Despite some of the less glamorous aspects and potential dangers, Chambers says cruises are still a great way to travel. “Cruises are brilliant fun – but they’re also floating cities, and that means everything from crime to chaos has to be accounted for.
A passenger of the notorious Carnival Triumph “poop cruise” said the Netflix documentary fails to capture the true horror of four days at sea without food, power and sanitation(Image: SWNS)
“The Trainwreck: Poop Cruise documentary might seem extreme, but outbreaks, delays, even onboard arrests are all part of the behind-the-scenes reality. It’s important travellers know what they’re signing up for – not to scare them, but to empower them,” she concludes.
That said, there are some passengers of the infamous cruise that argue that the documentary “doesn’t even scratch the surface” of how horrific the experience was.
The cruise voyage from Texas to Mexico descended into chaos after an engine room fire caused a massive electrical failure, leaving over 4,000 passengers and crew to wade through urine and feces and camp on deck.
Tay Redford, 24, a passenger who was only 12 at the time of the incident, says she felt “hurt” by the portrayal after watching the trailer. Tay vividly recalls the fear and chaos, arguing that Carnival failed to provide meaningful support after the ordeal.
“I’ve only seen the trailer, but from what I saw, it doesn’t even scratch the surface,” she said. “It’s just Carnival workers telling the story. It’s really hard watching the documentary come out and seeing all these people making money from it.
Julie Gallagher sold her house through Connells’ Abingdon office, where Panorama went undercover
“She’s probably done me out of quite a bit of money – I feel angry and conned.”
Julie Gallagher believes her home was sold at a lower price than it could have gone for. There was a buyer who might have offered more for it, an undercover investigation by BBC Panorama can reveal.
Her Connells estate agent appeared to sideline this potential buyer in favour of someone else who had agreed to take out an in-house mortgage.
That mortgage was said to be worth about £2,000 to Connells, while the company potentially stood to make £10,000 in total by arranging add-on services and selling the buyer’s property too.
“She sat on this sofa… and said she was actually working for me and she obviously is not, she’s working for the company’s ends,” says Julie. “How dare Connells do that? Just appalling.”
Panorama decided to investigate the company after speaking to more than 20 independent financial advisers (IFAs) and mortgage advisers from across England and Wales who had concerns about how the company operated.
One of the biggest estate agencies in the UK, Connells runs 80 chains with more than 1,200 branches. Our undercover reporter, Lucy Vallance, got a job in Abingdon, Oxfordshire, in an own-brand office.
Watch: In Abingdon, a potential buyer taking Connells’ in-house services appeared to be favoured over another who wasn’t
During her six weeks there in February, she found evidence that the senior branch manager favoured prospective buyers, if they were planning to take out Connells in-house services, like conveyancing or mortgages, because it made more money for the company.
Connells told us it is “committed to treating all customers and prospective buyers fairly.”
Panorama also investigated the online estate agency Purplebricks, after we heard concerns it had been trying to attract sellers by overvaluing properties.
Once a customer was signed up, staff then tried to convince them to cut the asking price, earning commission if successful – a former sales negotiator told us. The whistleblower, who worked for the company between June and October 2024, also filmed online meetings for Panorama.
Purplebricks told us price reductions were once a target for rewarding staff, but that is no longer the case, and it does not overvalue properties to win instructions.
‘Hot buyers’
In Abingdon, the undercover reporter found that trying to arrange mortgages could be as important as selling houses – and that Connells’ staff felt under pressure to get people signed up.
Connells, like many other estate agencies, has an in-house mortgage-brokering team.
The independent financial advisers we have spoken to – who compete for customers with estate agents’ in-house services – say this pressure can lead to some agents in the industry playing fast and loose with the rules.
One practice known as “conditional selling” is forbidden by the Code of Practice for Residential Estate Agents, of which many companies across England, Wales, and Northern Ireland – including Connells – are signatories.
This is when an estate agent suggests, implies or tells you that you must arrange things like mortgages or conveyancing services through their in-house teams – or there will be negative consequences for a deal.
It means estate agents signed up to the code know they should not discriminate against prospective buyers who don’t use their in-house services.
Connells’ senior branch manager told our reporter, at one point, that she understood conditional selling was not allowed.
But that wasn’t the full picture.
Estate agents are supposed to work in the best interests of their clients, but we saw how pressure for profit shaped decisions at Connells in Abingdon.
One Saturday, our reporter was asked to host an open-house viewing for Julie’s four-bedroom house, which was on the market for offers over £300,000. It attracted great interest. Fifteen people attended and others also wanted to book separate viewings.
But the following Monday, the senior branch manager seemed interested in two possible buyers – those speaking to Connells’ in-house brokers. The next day, via WhatsApp, she told her staff not to arrange any more viewings on Julie’s house.
One signed up to a Connells-brokered mortgage and became known by the senior branch manager as a “hot buyer”.
A board in the office titled “Hot Buyers” had the names of all house hunters at the branch who had agreed to take out a mortgage or a conveyancing package through Connells.
The hot buyer for Julie’s house made an initial offer, which she rejected, but eventually upped it to successfully secure the property.
There was another potential buyer interested in the house who appeared to have deeper pockets – a cash buyer. She wasn’t taking out a mortgage through the company.
Connells told us they spoke to the cash buyer the Monday after the open house and that she was undecided about putting in an offer. A call from the cash buyer later the same day was missed, said the company, and not followed up.
When the undercover reporter told the office administrator that the cash buyer might have offered more, she was told that “just a sale” was “not good enough” for Connells.
“They will probably more likely aim to get somebody who’s signed up with us and wants to use our conveyancing, as opposed to someone who is a cash buyer,” said the administrator. “That’s just how Connells are. That’s why they ride you if you don’t have enough mortgage appointments.”
Connells’ senior branch manager has “taken options out of my hands and probably done me out of quite a bit of money”, says Julie Gallagher
Lisa Webb, consumer law expert with Which? Magazine, reviewed Panorama’s evidence of how this sale was managed.
“This is absolutely something that should be against the law – and something that I think that these estate agents really ought to be investigated by the authorities for, because this should not be happening,” she told us.
The undercover reporter secretly filmed her boss – the senior branch manager – saying why she was so keen on the hot buyer. Not only would it mean collecting fees from the seller, the manager explained, but also commission from the in-house mortgage with conveyancing fees on top.
In addition, Connells would try to sell the hot buyer’s old house – and earn more fees.
The senior branch manager said the combined deal could, in total, be worth £10,000 to the company.
“That, in itself, is just appalling behaviour,” said Lisa Webb from Which? when we showed her the footage.
Connells says “no harm has been caused” to the customer
According to the 1979 Estate Agents Act it is classed as an “undesirable practice” for estate agents to discriminate against prospective buyers if they don’t take out a mortgage through in-house brokers.
If they do this, they can be investigated by Trading Standards. But it looks like the rules may not cover the sidelining of potential buyers as seen by Panorama’s undercover reporter.
Those rules need to be updated, according to financial journalist Iona Bain.
“There’s clearly a grey area here, whereby estate agents are able to accept one buyer that will use the in-house broker and turn everybody else away,” she told us.
Homeowner Julie, who has now packed up and left her house ahead of the sale going through, was horrified when we told her what had happened.
“I’m quite appalled really that… she [senior branch manager] has kind of taken options out of my hands and probably done me out of quite a bit of money, really.”
If you have more information about this story, you can reach Panorama directly by email – [email protected]
Connells said it rejects “any accusation of conditional selling” and that “no harm has been caused” to the customer. There were other offers on Julie’s property, it told us, but the accepted offer was the highest.
“It is not the case that customers who use our mortgage services are more likely to successfully purchase a property than those who do not,” it added. It said that in the six-week period Panorama was undercover, only two properties out of 14 went to customers using the in-house mortgage service.
It also said it invests “significant time and resources in training our teams to ensure they understand the laws, regulations and guidelines within which they must operate”.
“Any employee found to be in breach of these standards faces strict disciplinary action, including dismissal,” Connells said.
The senior branch manager told Panorama she was content for Connells to respond on her behalf.
‘Overvaluing properties massively’
At Purplebricks, a whistleblower began secretly filming meetings because she says she became frustrated with how the company was being run.
Firstly on her phone, then with a camera provided by Panorama.
The biggest shock for the whistleblower was learning that staff were being incentivised to get price reductions on properties – many of which, she was told by one of the company’s local property agents, appeared to have been put on the market for more than they were worth.
“We are overvaluing properties massively just to gain instructions,” said the agent to the whistleblower in a private message.
Estate agents often use property valuations to attract customers – and subsequently dropping the asking price is not unusual. The estate agents’ code tells companies they “must never deliberately misrepresent the market value of a property”.
Purplebricks has adverts, like this one, which say customers can sell their homes for free
The whistleblower was also told in the same message from the agent that staff could earn commission if they persuaded sellers to drop their asking prices.
The same agent suggested to her that 18 price drops per month could earn staff £900 in commission.
In an online meeting, the whistleblower’s team leader told staff how to approach conversations with sellers about price drops.
He said, when properties go live, sellers can be told that if there aren’t many viewings or offers within the first four weeks then they should “have a conversation about [price] reduction”.
“So they won’t necessarily push the reduction there and then, but they will plant the seed,” he added.
Purplebricks told us it doesn’t overvalue properties and that while price reductions were once a target for rewarding staff, that was no longer the case. It said it doesn’t claim to be perfect and apologises wherever it has fallen short.
The Purplebricks whistleblower recorded online meetings for Panorama
Purplebricks staff were also under pressure to sell financial products like mortgages and conveyancing, the whistleblower told us.
During the time she worked there, she said the company encouraged customers to get their conveyancing done through companies it had deals with, rather than look elsewhere.
“We don’t want them to get a quote for comparison because we are by far and away very expensive,” said her team leader during an online meeting.
When Ryan Evans and Olivia Phelps bought a two-bedroom house in Sutton-in-Ashfield through Purplebricks they ended up buying conveyancing services through the company.
Ryan Evans told us he felt Purplebricks “had taken advantage of us a bit because we were first-time buyers”
They paid £2,820 last summer. Using price comparison websites, Panorama found that was nearly three times more than the current cheapest quote for the same property.
“We were none the wiser having never done all this before. I certainly felt like maybe they [Purplebricks] had taken advantage of us a bit because we were first-time buyers,” Ryan told us.
Like Connells, Purplebricks is also signed up to the Code of Practice for Residential Estate Agents which says: “You should provide a service to both buyers and sellers consistent with fairness, integrity and best practice.”
Our whistleblower also recorded her team leader firing-up staff to sell add-on products in addition to conveyancing.
“So let’s try and really squeeze every lead for as much as it’s got – and I want us to be a bit more relentless,” he told staff at one meeting. “The urgency is massive… there is still a heinous amount of money to be made.”
Anyone working in sales is encouraged to sell more, says Lisa Webb of Which?, but it is “a real issue” if an estate agent is “incentivising someone to make a very quick decision” or pressuring them “into making decisions too quickly… before they’ve had the option to shop around”.
Purplebricks said it entirely rejects any portrayal of its service as pressure-selling, adding that it does not promote hard-selling and that it focuses on the benefits, not price, when recommending services.
In a statement, it also said that since new owners took over in 2023, it has “worked hard to improve service and build a team and culture that puts customers first”.
The whistleblower’s team leader did not want to comment and told us he had left Purplebricks.
A new Netflix documentary has captured the horrors on-board the ship dubbed the ‘poop cruise’
A Netflix documentary has revealed the horrors of the ‘poop cruise’ where passengers camped on deck(Image: SWNS)
Holidaymakers on a lavish cruise liner were plunged into a real-life horror when a blaze cut off power, leaving them adrift in the Gulf of Mexico.
The ill-fated 2013 journey spiralled into chaos as the fire damaged electrical systems, immobilising the vessel and leaving it without lights, air conditioning, and even working loos.
This ordeal is now the focus of Trainwreck: Poop Cruise, a brand-new Netflix documentary released yesterday (June 24), which gives viewers a harrowing glimpse into the experiences of the Carnival Triumph’s passengers.
The preview hints at the chaos: “Soon raw sewage leaks out all over the ship, food supplies start dwindling and passengers begin to revolt. As the cruise company races to control the fallout, a media frenzy ensues. Soon everyone is talking about ‘The Poop Cruise’.”
Passengers began living on deck after the power went out(Image: Netflix)
Those intrigued by the incident and the boat featured in this new documentary may wonder what became of the ship. Some may even be brave enough to contemplate boarding her for a trip, reports Surrey Live.
But, is it still possible to book a holiday on the Carnival Triumph?
In line with standard practice for high-end cruise ships, the Carnival Triumph experienced a significant refurbishment and, as of 2019, has been navigating the seas with a new identity: Carnival Sunrise.
Still a favourite among cruisers, this celebrated liner remains operational throughout The Bahamas and the Caribbean with a lots of scheduled voyages for this year lined up, including a four-day trip to The Bahamas from Miami in November.
A spot in an inside cabin will cost travellers about $284 each, while those willing to splash out for a fancier space can expect to fork over up to $836 for a sumptuous luxury suite.
The ship was re-named the Carnival Sunrise after the debacle(Image: Nick de la Torre/Houston Chronicle via Getty Images)
TripAdvisor has seen recent guests sharing their experiences on-board. One said: “For an older ship, it’s still a lot of fun – just temper your expectations. We stayed in a balcony cabin on deck 8. Yes, the bathroom looks outdated with its bright blue sink and shower curtain – but it’s part of the charm.”
Another traveller gushed said: “I loved every minute of being on the ship. The food and shows were amazing… It was everything I wanted and more!”.
In the wake of the fire incident aboard Carnival Triumph and the subsequent scrutiny, Gerry Cahill, then the president and CEO of Carnival Cruise Lines, assured holidaymakers that such a calamity would “not happen again”, as he announced an inquiry into the cause of the blaze.
The documentary shows what passengers went through on the ship(Image: SWNS)
In response to the forthcoming Poop Cruise documentary, Carnival released a statement to Surrey Live’s Screen Time reporters, saying: “The Carnival Triumph incident over 12 years ago was a teachable moment for the entire cruise industry.
“A thorough investigation following the incident revealed a design vulnerability which was corrected and led Carnival Cruise Line to invest more than $500 million across our entire fleet in comprehensive fire prevention and suppression, improved redundancy, and enhanced management systems, all in support of our commitment to robust safety standards.
“This is in addition to our vigorous Health, Environmental, Safety and Security (HESS) protocols that guide the entire Carnival Corporation fleet as we maintain our commitment to industry leadership in this area.
“We are proud of the fact that since 2013 over 53 million guests have enjoyed safe and memorable vacations with us, and we will continue to operate to these high standards.”
Trainwreck: Poop Cruise is now available to stream on Netflix
