An article by the Babel publicationwhich uses the work of the InfoLight.UA Research and Analysis Group.
Until 2022, Lviv activist Ostap Stakhiv was a well-known anti-vaccination leader. During the pandemic, he argued that covid did not exist, and later said that 6G technology would allow light bulbs to use humans as a source of energy. He also argued that the UN has long been trying to reduce the number of people on earth and is inventing new ways to do so. In November 2021, Stakhiv was suspected by the SBU of “subversive activities during the pandemic” and was placed in a pre-trial detention center. However, despite suspicions of ties to Russia, he was released in January 2022 and began a new phase, waging war against the TCC and mobilization. Stakhiv and his associates have created a network of thousands of followers who, with their requests, effectively block the work of government agencies and representatives of the TCC. They call the Armed Forces of Ukraine an agent of Russia and deny the very existence of Ukraine. Babel’s correspondent Oleksandr Myasyshchev investigated what is known about this network, what it does, and what law enforcement should pay attention to.
Activist and failed politician
Ostap Stakhiv is 38 years old and was born in the Lviv region. He began his career in politics in 2005, when he headed the Svoboda party branch in Zhydachiv, Lviv region. In 2007, he ran on the party’s list for the Verkhovna Rada, but was deregistered because he did not indicate his source of income. The following year, Stakhiv left the party due to “certain disagreements.”
After that, he held rallies against illegal construction, blocked roads, organized actions “for the rights of ordinary people” and tried to get into politics again – he headed the Lviv city branch of the Ukrainian Party.
Registered on December 27, 2006, its ideology is Ukraine-centered. but not for long. He was kicked out because he was suspected of selling places on the party list. After that, Stakhiv tried to become a part of Batkivshchyna, but eventually founded his main project in 2012, the NGO Idea of the Nation. Over the years, it would grow into a structure with branches in several regions of Ukraine.
In 2013, Stakhiv ran for the Lviv Regional Council from the Ukrainian Republican Party.
A center-right party founded in 2006, and in 2014 it ran for parliament. Both times unsuccessfully. Even then, Stakhiv made many inappropriate and racist statements. He said that Petro Poroshenko and the government were vassals of Brussels
We are talking about the European Union. and the United States. He spoke out sharply against Muslims and migrants. He claimed that they commit most crimes in Ukraine, and that almost all prisoners in the EU are Muslims. In 2015, Stakhiv ran for mayor of the town of Vynnyky near Lviv, but received only 3% of the vote. In 2019, as a self-nominated candidate, Stakhiv ran again in the parliamentary elections and again failed.
All this time he was organizing protests, often shocking and on any topic. In 2014, together with his supporters, he brought a coffin to the Lviv court to demand the release of businessman Roman Kurylas, who was accused of fraud.
He was detained in 2012. Kurylas spent two years in jail, but was acquitted in 2015. Stakhiv actively covered the case and called himself “Kurylas’s human rights defender.” In 2016 , Stakhiv and his “Idea of the Nation” set up a tent city under the walls of the Strutyn distillery.
Lviv region, protesting against smuggling. In 2019, Stakhiv organized rallies against land privatization and opposed the development of Lviv.
To promote and publicize his “work” and views, Stakhiv has created several media outlets. In 2010, he published the newspaper “Ukrainian Offensive,” and now his battle sheet is the newspaper “Halytski Visti”
He publishes a printed newspaper 1-2 times a quarter. Until 2019, Stakhiv was also actively involved in the YouTube channel “Narodne Television”
He regularly posted videos there until 2019, covering his work. However, the channel never became popular and now has only 575 subscribers. Stakhiv’s real fame came with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Fighting quarantine and first popularity
In the spring of 2020, when Ukraine was quarantined due to the pandemic, Stakhiv immediately began to fight against it. He recorded videos saying that the pandemic was fake and that masks were being used to subdue people. In December 2020, Stakhiv created the Human Rights Movement, called himself the “People’s Mayor of Lviv,” and quickly gained supporters among anti-vaccinationists across the country.
In 2021, Stakhiv entered the infectious diseases department of a hospital in Irshava without a mask
Zakarpattia region, demanded to be allowed to see patients with COVID-19 and argued that the coronavirus did not exist. In November 2021 , he and his associates broke into a lyceum in Prykarpattia, where a teacher was suspended for refusing to be vaccinated. They demanded that the management return her to work.
Stakhiv often held rallies against vaccination and quarantine. These rallies were attended by up to several hundred people, but their broadcasts received tens of thousands of views. At one of the rallies in Kyiv , Stakhiv met with another anti-vaccinationist (and later collaborator), Kyrylo Stremousov.
Stakhiv still does not abandon conspiracy theories and fakes about the pandemic. But he also touches on other topics, for example, saying that modern LED light bulbs transmit human data, and that 6G technology will allow light bulbs to use humans as a source of energy. Stakhiv also believes that the UN is doing everything it can to reduce the number of people on earth. One of the proofs is vaccination, which allegedly kills people.
Stakhiv calls the Diia app an electronic banking concentration camp. According to him, Diia determines how much tax to collect from a person and will enforce it
This is not true. In Diia, you can fill out a tax return if you are an individual entrepreneur. If you don’t pay the full amount of taxes, the tax office will record it, but Diia cannot withdraw anything from your card on its own if you underpay. Stakhiv also says that “depersonalization of people” has begun in Ukraine because of the “electronic hryvnia”
A digital form of the Ukrainian currency that is supposed to be based on the blockchain. It has not been officially introduced yet because they started using numbers instead of names or nationality. “My friends called me and said that when they were undergoing a medical examination, they wrote 804 in the nationality column. Not Ukrainian, or Polish, or anything else, but 804,” Stakhiv says. ” This is an outright fake.
Stakhiv also claims that the “world government”
A widespread conspiracy theory that the entire world is run by a small group of people. already knows about the existence of disease “X”, which will cause 20 times more deaths than COVID-19. He thinks that governments will create new concentration camps to further restrict people’s freedom of speech and movement. In fact, “Disease X” is a euphemism for a potential infection that could cause a worse pandemic than COVID-19. The world is now only discussing these risks to better prepare for them.
Anti-vaccination and conspiracy theorizing made Stakhiv a well-known and popular blogger. In 2021, he already had more than 23 thousand subscribers on Telegram and 70 thousand subscribers on YouTube. Stakhiv’s channels are constantly being blocked for questionable statements and violations of YouTube rules, but he keeps opening new ones. On Telegram, Stakhiv’s main channel now has about 18 thousand subscribers.
War and the struggle against mobilization
Publicly, Stakhiv has always spoken out against Russian aggression. In the first months of the great war, he continued to publish videos about COVID-19. However, already in September 2022, Stakhiv and his Human Rights switched from the pandemic to mobilization. In his videos, he said that the CCC was “kidnapping and torturing people” and (expectedly) building concentration camps. One of the arguments is that the TCCs are not officially registered and that there is a relevant decision of the Supreme Court. According to Stakhiv, the summonses are also illegal. He says that they are incorrectly executed and use an unapproved coat of arms of Ukraine
This is a myth. The Constitution does state that the small state coat of arms should become part of the large state coat of arms. But until the draft is approved, Ukraine uses the trident as the official symbol of the state. Babel has already refuted some of these myths.
Stakhiv’s Human Rights Movement has 7,000 subscribers on Viber. But the main thing is a large local network in all regions on Viber
25 groups in regional centers. and Telegram
More than 30 groups… Telegram groups usually have a small number of people, from a few to 200. But Viber groups in Odesa and Kyiv have more than 3,000 members. In these chats, Stakhiv’s supporters spread his posts, as well as outright conspiracy theories. For example, that “Zionists”
According to the conspiracy theory, the “Zionists” allegedly want to enslave the whole world so that only Jews would rule it. The “Zionists” want to destroy Ukraine and Russia, the National Police is a foreign agent, the Armed Forces of Ukraine buys human organs (why is not specified), and activated carbon causes cancer.
Stakhiv’s structures also have a whole network of closed chats on Viber, Yuriy Honcharenko, founder of the InfoLight research and analytical group, tells Babel. He has been monitoring the media activity of Stakhiv and other conspiracy theorists since 2022.
“Conspiracy theories, esotericism, mysticism, prayers, and court decisions on the illegality of the TCC were spread in closed chats. These chats were needed to unite the participants and get them on the same page,” says Honcharenko. Subsequently, access to the chats was severely restricted, and the participants were checked more thoroughly.
Stakhiv himself is in public conflict with the TCC. On December 19, 2023, in Lviv, he was “illegally approached by the TCC,” including a combatant. Stakhiv argued to them that legally, the TCC and martial law are null and void, because war has not been declared in Ukraine. He said that a state of war is declared when the country is attacked, and martial law is declared when there is a threat of attack. This is not true. Stakhiv considered the request from the TCC to be illegal and called the police. Within 25 minutes, Stakhiv was approached by his “journalist,” who demanded documents from the police and representatives of the TCC and claimed that the TCC did not belong to the Armed Forces. Later, three more of the blogger’s associates approached. Together they began to bombard the police and military with questions. They demanded documents from them, filmed them, and then doubted that the police officer’s documents were real. Meanwhile, Stakhiv argued that the TCC did not exist at all. The scandal ended in nothing – the parties filed police reports against each other and parted ways.
“Association of Human Rights Defenders”
In March 2023, Stakhiv created a new NGO, the Association of Human Rights Defenders of Ukraine, and is actively recruiting new members. He teaches them to “protect their rights and freedoms.” Members of the association pay an entrance fee of UAH 2,500 and monthly dues of UAH 100.
This money is supposed to cover the coordinator’s expenses, including travel, Stakhiv explained. Stakhiv issues them “international certificates of human rights defenders” that have no legal force. But, according to the blogger, the certificates “protect” members of the NGO from the police, the TCC and other authorities. It is not known how many members this association has, but there are 4,000 people in the Telegram group.
The same theses about illegal TCCs and summonses are posted on the social media of the party. They call TCC workers “unknown persons in the form of fishermen” and urge them to call the police as soon as they appear on the horizon. The association also has a network of closed local groups in various messengers in many cities and villages. They were created so that members of the NGO could help each other in conflicts with the police, TCCs, and other structures. According to the community’s rules, if a member of the NGO is approached on the street by TCC employees, other members must come to his or her aid. Together they launch a stream, read out their rights to the military and prove that the actions of the TCC are illegal. And then they all file complaints with the police, prosecutor’s office or the State Bureau of Investigation.
Oleh Herich is the co-chair of the Association of Human Rights Defenders of Ukraine. He does not openly recognize Ukrainian citizenship and considers himself a citizen of the Ukrainian SSR. He calls Ukraine and Russia corporations.
Ukraine limited and Russia limited. rather than states, and the war is a “conflict of private military formations of corporations.” Gerich also believes that his Ukrainian passport is a fake of his real Soviet passport. For this reason, in January 2024, he filed a complaint with the prosecutor’s office and the police. Gerich urged his followers to do the same via social media – his Facebook post received almost a thousand reposts.
In April 2023, Stakhiv and Gerich opened paid courses for “journalists”. The cost varies from 2,500 to 7,500 hryvnias. Stakhiv explicitly stated that these courses are not for future work in the media, but for the “protection” of their rights. For example, how to behave with the police and what articles to call them to defend yourself. The courses are held online; the first one lasted about a month, and the last one lasted five days. Practical assignments include generating and sending as many requests and complaints to various government agencies as possible, or creating TikTok accounts with the note “citizen journalist.” One of the stated goals of the courses is to bring police officers and TCC members to justice.
“The introductory webinar of the course was free, and Herych talked about how he was bombarded with complaints and actually blocked the work of various bodies,” said Alyona Romaniuk, a media expert and founder of the Nota Enota anti-fake project.
On February 27 , 2024 , the United boasted that each participant in the last course of journalists sent between 200 and 500 requests for public information. One of them was about the total number of TCC employees in Ukraine.
Oleg Gerich himself described the nature of the courses in detail when he spoke about one of the lectures. He and his “students” spent four hours analyzing the Cabinet of Ministers’ resolution on CCCs and social support centers. Gerich stated: “The TCC is a subdivision of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea. That is, this body actually recruits to the “army of Russia, the RSFSR
Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic.” Therefore, Gerich says, all TCC employees are agents of Russia and are managed by the Crimean TCC
This is outright nonsense – since Ukraine does not recognize the annexation of Crimea, all government agencies on the peninsula are located on the mainland of Ukraine and are subject to Ukrainian laws.
“Accordingly, all the people who went to fight, having signed an agreement with the TCC and the JV, are agents and servicemen of the Russian Federation on the territory of Ukraine,” Gerich said, adding that he would tear up his military ID card, refusing to “participate in a fratricidal war.”
In order to receive a certificate of “human rights journalist” from Stakhiv and Gerich, people had to pass a practical exam, says Yuriy Goncharenko of InfoLight. Namely, they had to approach TCC employees on the street, prove that their actions were illegal, overwhelm them with a list of articles of the Constitution and “force them to retreat.”
“At first, they massively publicly attacked TCC employees on the streets to incite hatred and radicalize them. As a result, some TCC employees began to act inappropriately. And now Stakhiv and his supporters are spreading these episodes as much as possible,” explains Goncharenko.
Currently, the Telegram training group has more than 400 users. “Graduates” of the courses receive certificates of “human rights journalists” or “human rights defenders” from Stakhiv and Gerich. The “teachers” themselves wear certificates with the inscription “Press”. The “journalists” also work for Stakhiv’s media outlet and receive a salary. Stakhiv himself says he receives money from “supporters”.
Stakhiv and the team’s activity is not limited to the Internet. In January-February 2024, they were actively traveling to villages, gathering locals and “liberating people from the captivity of the TCC.” At the end of January 2024, Stakhiv’s group came to Berezne, Rivne region, to “free a local resident, Vasyl Pleskach, from the TCC’s captivity.” According to the latter, the TCC employees issued him a summons, and then held him for several days and beat him. Later, the man was released, but Stakhiv’s team began writing statements to the police and gathering locals in the village. Together, they went to the police with questions and broke into the DBR by force.
After the Pleskach scandal, on January 30, the city authorities of Berezny held a meeting between the community and the TCC, just as they did in the village of Kosmach, where locals beat a woman and her child who was “guiding the TCC.” At the meeting in Berezne, Stakhiv’s people provoked a scandal.
Stakhiv and the SBU
In November 2021, Stakhiv received a suspicion from the SBU for “subversive activities during the pandemic” and was placed in a pre-trial detention center. He faced 5 to 10 years in prison.
Future collaborator Kyrylo Stremousov came to support Stakhiv in court. The SBU claimed that Stakhiv was trying to destabilize the situation in Ukraine and seize power with anti-vaccination slogans. He and other anti-vaccinationists allegedly planned to create their own communities in Ukraine and even sought weapons for this purpose. The SBU suggested that this network was supervised and financed by Russia. Stakhiv himself denies this.
In January 2022, Stakhiv was released from the pre-trial detention center after his supporters allegedly raised almost UAH 1 million for his bail. In 2022, the Halytskyi District Court in Lviv issued an indictment against Stakhiv, but there is still no verdict. In 2023, the courts were deciding whether Lviv or Kyiv’s Pechersk Court should handle the anti-vaccinationist’s case. The Supreme Court ruled that the case should remain in Lviv, and Stakhiv’s lawyer appealed. On February 21, 2024 , the Supreme Court’s cassation finally confirmed that the case should be heard by the Halych District Court.
The Security Service says that they are aware of Stakhiv’s current activities and are monitoring them, including when he opened his training sessions. They have not announced any new suspicions against him. “Babel sent a request to the service to find out whether it was aware of the activities of Stakhiv’s team in terms of mobilization and the TCC. At the time of publication, we have not received a response.
Meanwhile, the SBU is already investigating two of Stakhiv’s associates, Andriy Rachyk and Yaroslav Zhur. They regularly record streams with Stakhiv and attend rallies with him. In 2020 , Andrii Rachyk overthrew a Hanukkah service in Kyiv and was suspected by the police. In February 2024, Rachyk received another suspicion for anti-Semitism and justifying Russian aggression. Stakhiv publicly supported Rachyk and called the case against him “repression by Satanists.”
In November 2023, the SBU conducted searches at the home of another Stakhiv associate, Yaroslav Zhur. He is also suspected of inciting ethnic hatred, including anti-Semitism.
The earth is not flat, it is not the Freemasons (but Putin) who are behind the war in Ukraine, and Stakhov is a liar and a conspirator. This is just to reinforce the point.
Author: Alexander Myasishchev Editor: Yuliana Skibitska
