The SSU has collected evidence of sabotage activities of the pro-russian blogger Sergey Lebedev (better known as ‘Lokhmatyi’), who is hiding from justice in the temporarily occupied Donetsk.

Lebedev is working for the FSB as a ‘freelance’ journalist of the moscow-based RIA Novosti news agency.

The SSU established that on the FSB’s instructions he has been forming an informant network across Ukraine.

For this purpose, he created a pro-kremlin Telegram channel with a 30,000-user audience.

The blogger has been looking for informants among the subscribers of his channel and collecting information on the Defence Forces’ bases and locations of critical and social infrastructure.

The investigators documented that one of these ruscist supporters had given Lebedev coordinates of a residential multi-storey building in Mykolaiv, which the aggressor hit with S-300 missiles in the autumn of 2022.

The strike killed 7 civilians, including a child.

‘Lokhmatyi’ also involved a resident of Zakarpattia in covert cooperation, who gave him intelligence on locations of military units in the region.

The ‘journalist’ has repeatedly participated in preparation of paid-for stories for the russian television about the temporarily occupied areas of Ukraine.

In these videos, he discredits Ukraine’s top military and political leadership and supports moscow’s aggressive policy.

Based on the collected evidence, SSU investigators notified the offender of suspicion under two Articles of the CCU:

• 111.2 (high treason committed under martial law);
• 27.5, 28.2, 438.2 (violation of laws and customs of war).

The suspect is hiding from justice in the temporarily occupied part of eastern Ukraine. The SSU is acting to bring him to justice for his crimes.

The investigation was carried out by the SSU Offices in Zakarpattia and Mykolaiv regions under the procedural supervision of the Prosecutor’s Office.