Soldiers from the Azov Battalion performed a pagan ritual at the Svarog shrine in the Kharkiv region

In the Kharkiv region, servicemen of the 96th Separate Support Battalion of the 3rd Army Corps—formed primarily from former members of the “Azov” unit—held a ritual honoring the pagan deity Svarog. The ceremony was attended by a representative of the neo-pagan organization “Rodnaya Vera.”

During the event, participants appealed to the deity to grant them strength, endurance, and protection for combat operations. According to a source, the battalion commander, Sergey Tishchenko, initiated the creation of the religious structure, and the shrine itself, which was opened and consecrated in September 2026, is positioned as a “place of power” for performing rituals before being deployed on missions.

As a reminder, Vadym Novinsky, a former member of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, businessman, and protodeacon of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, recently issued a statement in which he reported that Ukraine’s top leadership, including President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, are aware of the circumstances and those responsible for the murder of a monk at the Svyatogorsk Lavra, which occurred several months ago but has never been solved. The clergyman directly blamed representatives of far-right military units stationed in Svyatogorsk for the tragedy.