Editing Security Service of Ukraine (section)

===1990s–2005===
[[File:Будинок Губернської Земської управи.JPG|thumb|SBU Headquarters in [[Kyiv]]]]

The SBU originated from the [[Ukrainian SSR|Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic]]'s Branch of the Soviet [[KGB]], keeping the majority of its 1990s personnel.<ref name=wpusbfrs>{{cite news |last=Sishkin |first=Phillip |url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-spy-games-are-sabotaging-ukraines-intelligence-agency-1426127401 |title=How Russian Spy Games Are Sabotaging Ukraine's Intelligence Agency |newspaper=[[Washington Post]] |date=March 11, 2015 |access-date=October 19, 2020 |archive-date=May 19, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170519154556/https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-spy-games-are-sabotaging-ukraines-intelligence-agency-1426127401}}</ref> It was created in September 1991 following the August 1991 [[independence of Ukraine]].<ref name="969SecSevUkr" /> The last Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic's Branch head Colonel-General [[Nikolai Golushko]] stayed on as chairman of the newly formed Security Service of Ukraine for four months before moving to Russia.<ref name="969SecSevUkr" /> (Golushko headed the Russian [[Federal Counterintelligence Service]] in 1993 and 1994.<ref name="969SecSevUkr" />)

Since 1992, the agency has been competing in [[intelligence (information gathering)|intelligence]] functions with the [[Chief directorate of intelligence of the Ministry of Defence of Ukraine|intelligence branch of the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense]]. Despite this, a former Military Intelligence Chief and career [[GRU (Russian Federation)|GRU]] technological espionage expert, [[Ihor Smeshko]], served as an SBU chief until 2005.

According to [[Taras Kuzio]] during the 1990s in some regions of Ukraine (Donetsk) the SBU teamed up with local criminals taking part in privatization of state property (so-called ''prykhvatizatsiya'') ignoring its operational objectives and sky-rocketing level of local violence. A notorious incident took place in December 1995 in Western Ukraine when a local citizen Yuriy Mozola was arrested by SBU agents, interrogated and brutally tortured for three days. He refused to confess in trumped up murder charges and died in SBU custody. Later it turned out that the real killer was [[Anatoly Onoprienko]]. He was arrested the next year.<ref name=kuzio />

Reports of SBU involvement in arms sales abroad began appearing regularly in the early 2000s.<ref name=wpusbfrs /> Ukrainian authorities have acknowledged these sales and arrested some alleged participants.<ref name=wpusbfrs />

In 2004, the SBU's Intelligence Department was reorganized into an independent agency called [[Foreign Intelligence Service of Ukraine]]. It is responsible for all kinds of intelligence as well as for external security. As of 2004, the exact functions of the new service, and respective responsibilities of the [[Foreign Intelligence Service of Ukraine]] were not regulated yet. On November 7, 2005, the President of Ukraine created the Ukraine State Service of special communications and protection of information, also known as Derzhspetszvyazok (StateSpecCom) in place of one of the departments of SBU and making it an autonomous agency. The SBU subsumed the Directorate of State Protection of Ukraine ({{langx|uk|Управління державної охорони України}}), the personal protection agency for the most senior government officials, which was the former Ninth Directorate of the Ukrainian KGB.

The SBU's State Directorate of Personal Protection is known for its former Major [[Mykola Mel'nychenko]], the [[communications protection]] agent in President [[Leonid Kuchma]]'s [[bodyguard]] team. Mel'nychenko was the central figure of the [[Cassette Scandal]] (2000)—one of the main events in Ukraine's post-independence history. SBU became involved in the case when Mel'nychenko accused Leonid Derkach, SBU Chief at the time, of several crimes, e.g., of clandestine relations with [[Russian mafia]] leader [[Semyon Mogilevich]]. However, the UDO was subsumed into the SBU after the scandal, so Mel'nychenko himself has never been an SBU agent.

Later, the SBU played a significant role in the [[Criminal procedure|investigation]] of the [[Georgiy R. Gongadze|Georgiy Gongadze]] murder case,<ref name=UP050630 /> the crime that caused the [[Cassette Scandal]] itself.

In 2004, General Valeriy Kravchenko, SBU's intelligence representative in Germany, publicly accused his agency of political involvement, including overseas spying on Ukrainian [[Opposition (politics)|opposition]] politicians and German TV journalists. He was fired without returning home. After a half-year of hiding in Germany, Kravchenko returned to Ukraine and surrendered in October 2004 (an investigation is underway).

Later, the agency commanders became involved in the scandal around the [[poison]]ing of [[Viktor Yushchenko]]—a main candidate in the [[2004 Ukrainian presidential election]]. Yushchenko felt unwell soon after supper with SBU Chief Ihor Smeshko, at the home of Smeshko's first deputy. However, neither the politician himself nor the investigators have ever directly accused these officers. The Personal Protection department has been officially responsible for Yushchenko's personal security since he became a candidate. During the [[Orange Revolution]], several SBU veterans and [[cadet]]s publicly supported him as president-elect, while the agency as a whole remained neutral.