Lavra’s lawyer filed a statement to NABU regarding violations in the Ministry of Culture and the "Kiev-Pechersk Lavra" reserve

On June 9, 2025, the lawyer of the Holy Dormition Kiev-Pechersk Lavra, Archpriest Nikita Chekman, filed a statement to the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine. The statement concerns criminal offenses committed by officials of the Ministry of Culture and Strategic Communications of Ukraine, as well as the National Kiev-Pechersk Historical and Cultural Reserve. They are accused of embezzlement and misuse of budget funds, which falls under articles 191 and 210 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine. This was reported on the lawyer’s Telegram page.

According to the report from the Accounting Chamber of Ukraine, from 2020 to 2023, the Ministry of Culture and the National Reserve allowed several serious violations:

Inefficient and improper use of funds amounting to up to 30 million UAH;

Violations of budgetary legislation;

Lack of a systematic approach to financing cultural heritage sites, which led to the emergency condition of dozens of Kiev-Pechersk Lavra’s objects.

According to the statement, these actions led to the catastrophic state of several cultural objects, which was the result of ineffective managerial decisions by the Ministry of Culture and insufficient attention to the preservation of cultural heritage.

Additionally, representatives of the Ministry and the Reserve in the media and at court hearings attempted to explain the termination of the contract with the monastery due to the allegedly inadequate condition of the property managed by the religious organization. However, the Accounting Chamber’s report indicates that the inconsistency of the Ministry’s decisions in the field of cultural heritage protection and the lack of a comprehensive approach to the preservation of monuments were the main factors leading to their destruction.

It is expected that in the near future, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine will begin a pre-trial investigation into the statement.

Earlier, it was reported that during a meeting of the Parliamentary Committee on Humanitarian and Information Policy on June 4, 2025, Deputy Minister of Culture and Strategic Communications Serhiy Belyaev criticized the results of the Ministry’s commission that worked in the territory of the National Kiev-Pechersk Reserve since March.