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Automatically translated version. May contain inaccuracies compared to the original.
🔒 The assets of the former UMH owned by Kurchenko remain under the control of the Goldsky family and the old managers.
In the fourth year of the full-scale war in Ukraine, media assets linked to fugitive oligarch Serhiy Kurchenko continue to operate. They are formally distributed among members of Viktor Goldsky’s family and the holding’s former managers, while actual control is likely concentrated in a single pair of hands. Goldsky is formally an employee of businessman Maksym Shkil.
In June 2013 Serhiy Kurchenko’s VETEK company acquired one of the largest Ukrainian media holdings — UMH group (Ukrainian Media Holding). According to Kurchenko himself, the deal cost about 340 million dollars. Management was carried out by the specially created “VETEK-Media.” UMH founder Borys Lozhkin insisted the deal was market-based, but many experts spoke of political motivation and the preparation of an information field ahead of the 2015 year.
After Kurchenko fled to Russia in 2014 the UMH assets were seized and transferred to ARMA’s management. Some of them were later sold or re-registered.
In 2018 the online publication Comments.UA (formerly a key media outlet of Kurchenko) became owned by Viktor Goldsky. From 2014 to 2015 he worked at UMH Group as commercial director under Olena Bondarenko — then chair of the holding’s supervisory board and a former MP from the Party of Regions.
Now Goldsky serves as editor-in-chief of some of the information resources of the former UMH and publishes commissioned articles. He is the official beneficiary of LLC “COMMENTS TODAY” and the owner of the domain name comments.ua.
Goldsky is married to Olha Khoroshaieva, who owns part of the assets, including LLC “To sho nado” and LLC “Publishing House Masavi.” According to open sources, her relatives are also involved in the scheme.
A telling example is the history of LLC “Evolution Media.” Kurchenko bought this company in 2013 and registered it to the Cypriot Sherell Limited. After his flight, the structure was rewritten and the ultimate owner became Yevhen Nazarenko — Olha Khoroshaieva’s stepfather, that is, Goldsky’s father-in-law. According to the investigation, the deal had signs of a formal rewrite: actual control is exercised by Goldsky. LLC “Evolution Media” appears in the declaration of Nina Khoroshaieva (Olha’s mother and Nazarenko’s wife), who holds the position of head of the Health Department of the Brovary City Council. Khoroshaieva also owns a stake in the Kyiv Weekly trademark — another former UMH asset.
Thus, formally the assets (“Comments.UA,” “Evolution Media,” “Kyiv Weekly”) are distributed among the “family trio” Goldsky–Khoroshaieva–Nazarenko, but, journalists conclude, real management is concentrated in Goldsky’s hands. Neither Nina Khoroshaieva nor Yevhen Nazarenko take part in the actual activities of these entities. Sherell Limited was previously recognized by courts as an entity associated with the criminal organization of the Yanukovych era.
A key role in preserving operational control is played by Volodymyr Brechko (a native of Irpin). He remains the director of most of the companies that formerly belonged to UMH.
In the GetContact app his number is tagged as “Vova Brechko VETEK,” “Volodya Mediaholding,” “Volodya Brechko Kurchenko,” “Ukrainian media holding,” and similar.
Among the companies where Brechko is a director: PJSC “STUDIO ‘EUROPOSITIV’,” LLC “UMH-MOBILE,” LLC “KORESPONDENT,” LLC “UKRAINIAN MEDIA HOLDING,” LLC “UMH PUBLISHING HOUSE,” LLC “BIGMIR ONLINE” and dozens more (radio groups, publishers, production companies).
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