First deputy chair of the Verkhovna Rada’s Energy Committee, MP Oleksiy Kucherenko (Batkivshchyna party), lashed out at Skhemy journalists (RFE/RL) and walked out of the interview after being asked about a possible conflict of interest in his work as a parliamentary commission chair and his ties to persons involved in the high-profile corruption case “Midas”, Skhemy reports.

The journalists say that Kucherenko gave no direct answer to the conflict of interest question, resporting to insults and disparaging remarks about the media workers instead, then ended the conversation. The RFE/RL project Skhemy posted the footage to Facebook.

“You are not journalists, you are just real morons. No offense. You are just degenerates, f***ing Radio Liberty, f***ing halfwits,” Kucherenko said.

“Excuse me, we will end the conversation about energy issues and nuclear power here. Thank you for your attention,” he continued.

In the written response the MP sent later, he said that saw no conflict of interest in the situation.

Skhemy report that in a previous Svoboda.Live broadcast Kucherenko denied being acquainted with the persons involved in the Midas case. At the same time, journalists have discovered some potential contacts between him and the suspects.

  • Reporters have verified recorded conversations between two defendants in the case, Ihor Myroniuk and Dmytro Basov. In the 9 July 2025 recording, Myroniuk says, “I’m going to f***ing talk to Kucherenko right now, let them bring this situation up at the commission meeting, in the committee…”. The defendants were discussing the possibility of restoring the moratorium on payments to Energoatom contractors, which was beneficial to their scheme, through Kucherenko and his parliamentary committee.
  • In 2016, Kucherenko personally sold a 374 sq. m luxury apartment in downtown Kyiv to Olena Tsukerman, the wife of Oleksandr Tsukerman (another person involved in the “Midas” case), by proxy. It was in that building that the suspects later set up a “back office” to collect cash.
  • The apartment was sold at 9 million UAH (about $340,000). Real estate experts say the market price at the time was at least twice as high, ranging from $673,000 to $875,000.

Kucherenko has denied being contacted by Mironiuk or Basov: “They certainly did not contact me… I didn’t realise who they were until the last moment. They did not request anything from me.”

He has explained that the apartment had to be sold at a lower price due to the difficult situation on the real estate market at the time, saying that “he should have sold it better.”

The MP added that he did not know Oleksandr Tsukerman personally, but had spoken with his wife a couple of times to “give advice so that they would not get swindled,” since he was selling the apartment through intermediaries.

Kucherenko also commented on the Nashi Groshi investigation into the energy minister Herman Halushchenko promoting businesses affiliated with his family, claiming that the investigation contained “a series of assumptions and is not fact-based.” At the same time, he admitted to being acquainted with businessman Mykola Zisko, calling him “my brother’s associate.”

NABU announced a special operation to expose corruption in the energy sector on 10 November 2025. The investigation revealed that the persons involved in a criminal organisation had built a large-scale scheme to influence strategic state-sector enterprises such as Energoatom.

The suspects in the Midas graft case had compiled hundreds of “dossiers” on journalists, officials, and NABU detectives; these included 10 journalists.