Odesa-based investigative journalist Grigory Kozma said on Aug. 2 that the car in which he and political activist Mykhailo Kuzakon were driving was rammed by a truck.
Kozma, head of the Hromadske Slidstvo investigative project, and Kuzakon, head of the Odesa branch of the People’s Movement of Ukraine party, have been highly critical of Odesa Mayor Hennady Trukhanov and his business associates, Alexander Angert and Vladimir Galanternik.
Trukhanov’s office did not respond to a request for comment but it has denied involvement in previous attacks on activists. Angert and Galanternik did not respond to requests for comment.
Kozma said that the truck had intentionally bumped into their car at a very high speed, and the driver of the truck escaped on a motorcycle. Kozma said that he and Kuzakon had not been injured.
Kozma also posted pictures of the severely damaged car.
Odesa Oblast police said it was investigating the incident and had opened a case on attempted murder.
Attacks in Odesa
Earlier, Vitaly Ustymenko, the leader of the Odesa branch of the AutoMaidan non-governmental group and a vehement critic of Trukhanov, Angert and Galanternik, was attacked and stabbed in Odesa on June 5, receiving light injuries. Ustymenko told the Kyiv Post he suspected Trukhanov, Angert and Galanternik of organizing the attack.
Trukhanov denied the accusations.
It is not the first attack on the activist: in February, Ustymenko was beaten during an arrest hearing for Trukhanov in a corruption case by pro-Trukhanov thugs. He was attacked after criticizing the court for releasing Trukhanov without bail.
Anti-corruption activists who have been assaulted in Odesa include Svitlana Pidpala, Alina Radchenko, Vladyslav Balinsky, Yuriy Dyachenko, Serhiy Sternenko, Georgy Barylenko, and Liliya Leonidova, a city councilor. All of them are critics of Trukhanov.
Previous attacks
Meanwhile, Vitaly Oleshko, a veteran of the war with Russia and critic of local authorities, was killed in the city of Berdyansk on July 31.
Oleshko’s suspected murderer is Artem Matiushyn, a former fighter of the volunteer Tornado Battalion. Mykola Zukur, a former deputy company commander with the Tornado Battalion, said that in 2015 Matiushyn and two other fighters had left a Tornado base had gone to serve in the Azov Regiment, although Azov denied links to Matiushyn.
Azov and its National Corps civilian arm are linked to Interior Minister Arsen Avakov.
Also on July 31, Kateryna Gandziuk, a local official and critic of Avakov’s police and pro-Russian politicians, was attacked with an acid in Kherson.
Masi Nayyem, a Kyiv-based social activist and lawyer, said he had “no doubts” that the acid assault on Gandziuk was instigated by “local pro-Russian forces like thug Kyryl Stremusov, who is a socialist from the party of Ilya Kiva,” a notorious former Avakov advisor and current head of the Interior Ministry’s labor union.
Interior Ministry spokesman Artem Shevchenko declined to comment. Commenting on the accusations, Kiva first lashed out at Gandziuk, accusing her of corruption, but then denied his party’s involvement in the atack.
On July 17, anti-corruption activist Vitaly Shabunin was assaulted with a green antiseptic in Kyiv by activists who protested against the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine. Shabunin suffered an eye burn.
One of the people who was filmed attacking Shabunin was Rostyslav Fedorko, an activist of Dmytro Korchynsky’s “Brotherhood” nationalist group. Korchynsky is a close associate of Avakov’s ex-aide Kiva, who led anti-NABU protesters on July 17. Kiva told the Kyiv Post he was a close friend of Korchynsky.
The anti-NABU activists also included employees of the National Police’s security police department, which is subordinate to Avakov, according to video footage published by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s “Schemes” investigative show. Kiva confirmed to the Kyiv Post that police officials had been among the anti-NABU activists but said he saw nothing wrong with that.
Recently other anti-corruption activists and whistleblowers had also been assaulted – Dmytro Bulakh and Yevhen Lisichkin in Kharkiv, judge Larysa Golnyk in Poltava, Vitaly Shabunin in Kyiv, Vitaly Ustymenko and Serhiy Sternenko in Odesa. Human rights lawyer Iryna Nozdrovska was killed in Kyiv in January, while journalist Pavel Sheremet was murdered in 2016.
On the eve of his murder, Sheremet met fighters of Azov, which is linked to Avakov. He had also been followed before his murder by Ihor Ustymenko, who was a Security Service of Ukraine employee as of 2014, according to an investigation by The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project.
