German investor Marjan von Heesen has appealed to the Prosecutor General's Office, the Volyn Regional State Administration and the media with a request to protect him from corrupt actions, threats and revenge by employees of the Kovel inter-district prosecutor's office. He stated this to journalists during a press conference on April 23, reports the Western Information Corporation A representative of the investors of OJSC "Kovel Furniture Factory," a German citizen, Baron Marjan von Heesen, accuses the prosecutor of the Kovel inter-district prosecutor's office, Serhiy Masalov, of carrying out psychological terror against him and his colleagues at work, as well as of arbitrarily blocking the work of wood-processing and furniture-manufacturing companies to which he is connected. In his opinion, "the reason is Masalov's revenge for the closure by the Prosecutor General's Office of criminal cases due to the absence of corpus delicti in my actions and the court's acquittal of my colleague Kostsovyat (executive director of OJSC "Kovel Furniture Factory" - ed.) in a criminal case initiated by Masalov." According to the German investor, the conflict between him and the prosecutor's office arose in 2000, after he "refused to comply with the whims of corrupt authorities." Criminal cases were opened against him and Volodymyr Kostsovyat by the Kovel inter-district prosecutor's office allegedly for causing significant damage to the state, the companies' documentation was seized, and their work was blocked. In 2004, all criminal cases against von Heesen were closed by the Prosecutor General's Office as unfounded. Volodymyr Kostsovyat proved his innocence in the charges brought against him in 4 courts of various instances and received acquittals. Although, according to the latter, during the court proceedings he was under constant pressure from the prosecutor's office, and there were direct threats from the first assistant prosecutor of the Kovel inter-district prosecutor's office, Oleksandr Borshch. After the criminal cases were closed, Marjan von Heesen filed a lawsuit against his offenders for compensation of moral damages in the amount of 10 million hryvnias. However, after the government changed in Ukraine, he withdrew the claim, as he hoped that under the new government such things would no longer happen. But both the prosecutor of the Kovel inter-district prosecutor's office, Serhiy Masalov, and the regional prosecutor, Andriy Hil, remained in their positions. The latter's position, according to Mr. Kostsovyat, "cannot be called anything other than a cover-up of the criminal actions of the Kovel inter-district prosecutor's office." At the same time, Marjan von Heesen claims that "all complaints about the dismissal of Masalov as a corrupt prosecutor's office employee yield no results." Another scandal erupted on April 22, when Marjan von Heesen "learned that the prosecutor had sent a letter to all state bodies with the aim of blocking my work in every possible way. The shipment of exports was stopped under the pretext of smuggling. A criminal case has again been opened against me, again in the same way as they were groundlessly opened over the last four years." First Deputy Head of the Volyn Regional State Administration Bohdan Shyba, who was tasked with sorting out the conflict situation, called such actions by the prosecutor's office a mockery of the Constitution. He assured that the regional authorities would do everything possible to dismiss those responsible from their positions, up to an official appeal on this matter to President of Ukraine Viktor Yushchenko