NGL.media team have collected clues that could lead to the persons responsible for the large-scale smear campaign targeting the Zakarpattia-based investigative journalist Olena Mudra, who reported on the dubious wind power plant construction in the Runa valley, NGL.media writes.
These clues, the news outlet writes, have been sent to the police through Mudra, but the police were unable to follow up on them for six months. Despite this, the case opened against the Mudra based on a likely forged anonymous letter has not been closed. Moreover, the company the journalist reported on has received permission to build the wind power plant in the Runa valley.
The news outlet writes that the Zakarpattia police received a letter containing serious allegations against Olena Mudra and environmentalist Oksana Stankevych-Volosianchuk in July 2025. The sender, who introduced themselves as Marik Fedirko, accused both women of embezzling tens of thousands of dollars they had allegedly received as a grant for an “environmentalist LGBT meeting” that was supposed to take place in the Runa valley but the two women never organised. The police opened proceedings against the journalist and the environmentalist on suspicion of fraud within two days of receiving the letter. This case has not been closed yet.
NGL.media found that:
- there are no people in Ukraine named Marik Fedirko;
- the listed Kyiv address is that of an office;
- there is no registered NGO named LGBT Aktyv Ukraine, which the sender wrote on behalf of.
Meanwhile Mudra has been targeted in a smear campaign, with libel being promoted:
- by dozens of dubious news websites;
- on Facebook by a profile named “Marik Fedirko”, which used a photo of a Brazilian man named Flavio Silvo, according to face recognition services.
Olena Mudra believes that this campaign was triggered by her advocacy work to preserve the Carpathians from wind farm development.
Simultaneously, Wind Parks Ukraine, the company behind the project to build windmills in the Runa valley, filed two defamation lawsuits against Mudra, demanding UAH 50,000 in moral damages in each lawsuit. One was dismissed, the other granted in part; the case is currently on appeal. The company denies involvement in the smear campaign.
Other clues found by NGL.media included the phone number used to send the letter. Analysis by Molfar Intelligence Institute showed that the number was never used for private matters, and the journalists’ attempts to contact the owner yielded no result.
The journalists added that details of the card used to pay at the post office could also be used to identify the sender of the letter. The journalist’s lawyer has asked the police to request the data from Ukrposhta, but investigators have not received the information yet.
The Zakarpattia Oblast Police press service informed NGL.media verbally that they were still waiting for the findings of the examination reviewing the disparaging articles about Olena Mudra. This examination should establish whether these articles contain calls for harrassment of the journalist or obstruction of her reporting.
Mudra says that not only do the police not know based on whose statement they opened the case against her, but they did not even interview the owners of the websites posting defamatory statements about her. The questions of who posted these articles and who commissioned them remains unanswered.
At the time of publication of the NGL.media article, the Zakarpattia police refused to provide the news outlet with an extended comment on the investigation.
Previously
On 9 June 2025, Zakarpattia-based investigator journalist Olena Mudra said she was being targeted in a smear campaign in the media. She believes the campaign was triggered by her reporting. She said that several disreputable media outlets had published a deceptive article with false information about her sources of income (alleging she works for Russia and Russian money) and her family.
Olena believes that these incidents are connected with her investigations into the work of LLC Wind Parks Ukraine in Zakarpattia oblast.
Olena Mudra filed a police statement on obstruction of her lawful reporting and violation of her privacy on 27 June 2025. The data was entered into the Unified Register of Pre-Trial Investigations (URPTI) on the following day, 28 June.
Earlier attacks
In May 2023, Olena Mudra reported doxxing and pressure related to her reporting. The pressure began following her article about staff changes at the State Environmental Inspection in Zakarpattia oblast, which was published in Zakarpattia Online on 6 March under the headline “Former head of the Economy Protection Office and heir to an illegal construction project in Bukovel, Mykhailo Bank, is now head of SEI Zakarpattia.”
The police responded to Olena’s statement by opening a case under Part 2 of Article 171 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (“Obstruction of legal reporting”).
In September 2023, unknown persons tried to access the Telegram profile of Olena Mudra, an investigator journalist from Zakarpattia, twice. She believes this has to do with her reporting.
