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Automatically translated version. May contain inaccuracies compared to the original.
Vadym Novynskyi settled in the Balkan country in August 2023.
People’s Deputy of the VII–IX convocations, founder of the financial-industrial group “Smart-Holding,” sanctioned Vadym Novynskyi has been in Croatia since 24 August 2023. In this Balkan country, the Ukrainian ex-politician is under temporary protection. Which specific form of protection is meant is not specified in the court rulings reviewed by “Glavcom.”
From the ruling of the Grand Chamber of the Supreme Court dated 17 September, it became known that Novynskyi tried to suspend the effect of several types of personal sanctions applied to him in Ukraine since January 2023. In particular, the former MP asked the judiciary to partially suspend the effect of the NSDC decision of 24 January 2023 (put into effect by the president’s decree on the same day) insofar as it imposed sanctions on him in the form of asset blocking; restrictions on trade operations (complete cessation); restrictions, partial or complete cessation of transit of resources, flights, and transportation across the territory of Ukraine (complete cessation); and suspension of the fulfillment of economic and financial obligations.
During court hearings, Novynskyi’s lawyers insisted: “the sanctions applied to the claimant are aimed at the complete blocking of the vitally necessary elementary physical needs of any person’s existence.”
In addition, the ex-MP’s defenders assured the court that their client, who in Ukraine is also suspected of treason and inciting religious enmity and hatred, was allegedly ready to come for questioning to the SBI investigators. However, they explained that Novynskyi must have the opportunity on Ukrainian territory “to secure his living and exercise fundamental rights.”
As a result, the Grand Chamber of the Supreme Court denied Vadym Novynskyi’s request to partially suspend the effect of the NSDC decision, because, in the court’s view, the method of securing the claim chosen by the plaintiff effectively amounted to suspending an act of the president of Ukraine and establishing a prohibition on performing actions arising from such a decision.”
Add that in 2023 Novynskyi filed two lawsuits against President Zelensky seeking to cancel the sanctions. The cases are still under consideration.
In Ukraine, 15 types of sanctions have been applied to Vadym Novynskyi until June 2029. In September 2025 Ukraine declared the ex-MP wanted. The basis for the search, as stated on the Ministry of Internal Affairs website, was the announcement of suspicion against the oligarch in January 2025 under the articles “Treason” (part 1 of art. 111 of the Criminal Code) and “Incitement of religious enmity and hatred” (part 2 of art. 161 of the Criminal Code).
According to the investigation’s version, no later than 2018 Novynskyi, acting in coordination with the Patriarch of Moscow, Primate of the Russian Orthodox Church Kirill, began disseminating information supporting Russian Federation policies aimed at weakening Ukrainian independence and spreading narratives and ideology of the “russkiy mir.” In particular, he did this in numerous interviews and in his social media posts in the style of Russian propaganda.
The ex-MP also made claims about the OCU and the UOC-KP, “characterizing them in negative and stigmatizing expressions that can be interpreted as inciting hatred and enmity on religious grounds.”
Furthermore, in the SBI press release Novynskyi was called a “curator” of the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine. It is also stated that the oligarch was hierarchically subordinate to Patriarch Kirill and communicated closely with him. Novynskyi did not even hide such a connection; on the contrary. The billionaire is a cleric of the UOC-MP and has direct access to the Primate of this branch of the Russian Church in Ukraine, Metropolitan Onufriy (open sources report that the hierarch allegedly holds a Russian passport. After that, the president terminated Onufriy’s Ukrainian citizenship).
Earlier, at the requests of the Main Investigative Department of the State Bureau of Investigation, the judiciary arrested Novynskyi’s real estate (an apartment of 666,7 sq. m in the city center; two land plots totaling 0,2 ha in Kozyn near Kyiv) and his Mercedes-Benz V250 d, year of manufacture 2017.
Also arrested was 8 million UAH bail that in the autumn of 2016 Vadym Novynskyi posted for former first deputy head of the Odesa Regional State Administration Oleksandr Orlov, who is suspected of involvement in the mass disturbances in Odesa in February 2014.
In July 2022 the Verkhovna Rada prematurely terminated Vadym Novynskyi’s parliamentary powers, who decided to focus on humanitarian and church matters. After losing his mandate the oligarch left Ukraine. Social media users spotted Novynskyi on vacation in Croatia; at a Sunday service in the largest Russian Orthodox church in Zurich; in Jerusalem with the Holy Fire.
Document: PDF proof of the original version of the news item "Новинський перебуває під тимчасовим захистом Хорватії. Зявилися нові деталі про екснардепа-утікача – Підозра". It records the publication content at the moment of the first scan, the preservation date and the source: AgroDay – uncensored on the main issues.
