Kiev, December 10, 2019
Photo: myrotvorets.news
The Ukrainian website “Mirotvorets” (“Peacemaker”), which threatened His Beatitude Metropolitan Onuphry of Kiev and All Ukraine and several other hierarchs of the canonical Orthodox Church, and which enjoyed the backing of the Ukrainian government, is reportedly shutting down.
A statement on the site itself reads: “Today, 10.12.2019 at 6:00 PM, to the delight of the media, militants, and Russian mercenaries, as well as at the request of some objective circumstances, we are completely shutting down Mirotvoret’s servers, namely: the site myrotvorets.center and all its mirrors.”
The site included a “Chistilische” (“limbo” or “purgatory”) database of supposed enemies of and threats to Ukraine, which included several hierarchs of the canonical Ukrainian, Russian, and Serbian Churches.
In October, Andrej Hunko, a German MP with Ukrainian roots, personally appealed to Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky to secure the shutdown of the “criminal website.” The MP notes that he also was included in the “Chistilische” section, which he, “of course consider[ed] a threat and a call for politically-motivated violence.”
The site is known to have published the personal information of its “enemies,” and some of those people have been known to wind up dead. Site founder George Tuka responded to the murder of Ukrainian author Oles Buzina and former Verkhovna Rada Deputy Oleg Kalashnikov just days after the site published their home addresses in April 2015 by saying, “This site contains data on more than 25,000 men. More than 300 of them are either arrested or killed. So why should I worry about some two lowlifes who are guilty of war?”
Clergy of the UOC included in the site’s database have also received threats.
Among those deemed “enemies of Ukraine” by the nationalist site are Patriarch Irinej of Serbia, Met. Onuphry, Metropolitan Luke of Zaporozhye, Metropolitan Paul of Vyshogorod and Chernobyl, the abbot of the Kiev Caves Lavra, Archbishop Ambrose of Verey of the Russian Church, Metropolitan Vladimir, the abbot of the Pochaev Lavra, Archbishop Philaret of Novaya Kahovka, Bishop Philaret of Lviv, Metropolitan Ephraim of Krivoy Rog, Metropolitan Theodore of Kamenets-Podolsky, Metropolitan Mark of Khust, and Metropolitan Hilarion of Donetsk, among others.
Even Roger Waters, the legendary bassist for Pink Floyd, Eurovision singer Yulia Samoylova, and actor Steven Seagal are considered a threat to Ukrainian national security.
Gov’t links
While the site declares the Mirotvorets Center to be an independent NGO, it in fact has several links to the Ukrainian government. The site was launched in December 2014 by politician and activist George Tuka, as he announced on his Facebook page. Tuka served as the governor of the Lugansk Oblast from 2015-2016, and has served as Deputy Minister for the Ukrainian Ministry of Temporarily Occupied Territories and IDPs since April 2016.
The Mirotvorets Center is led by Roman Zaitsev, a former employee of the Lugansk branch of the Security Service of Ukraine.
Further, the site is curated by the Security Service of Ukraine and promoted by Anton Gerashchenko, an MP and aide to the Interior Minister, according to the International Business Times.
In May 2016, the site published the phone numbers, email addresses, and addresses of 4,508 journalists and media members from around the world who had worked in Donbass, and therefore, as Mirotvorets claims, “cooperated with terorrists.” Although the information was obtained by hacking into the databases of the Ministry of State Security of the Donetsk People’s Republic, the Security Service of Ukraine declared the site had violated no laws.
Mirotvorets has been highly praised by hierarchs of the schismatic “Kiev Patriarchate,” including by “Patriarch” Philaret Denisenko himself, who bestowed a medal “For the sacrifice and love for Ukraine” upon the team behind the site.
