Aider Muzhdabayev

Aider Muzhdabayev is a Russian and Ukrainian journalist and media manager.

Deputy Editor-in-Chief of the newspaper Moskovsky Komsomolets (2008–2015), member of the Union of Crimean Tatars of Moscow. Deputy Director General of ATR, the first Crimean Tatar television channel (since 2015).

Since relocating from the Russian Federation to Ukraine in 2015, Muzhdabayev has actively engaged in a campaign of harassment against believers and clergy of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC).

While serving as Director General of the ATR television channel, the journalist used his position to incite hatred and to call for violence against Orthodox Christians.

Muzhdabayev has repeatedly allowed himself to make public calls for the harassment of Orthodox Christians, demanded a complete ban on the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, and proposed taking clergy hostage.

19 April 2020 — On his YouTube channel, Muzhdabayev publicly fueled hysteria and hatred toward the UOC during the quarantine period.

The journalist called the UOC “one of the main breeding grounds of coronavirus in Ukraine,” a “Church of evil, a Church of murder, which does not value either Ukraine as a state or Ukrainians as a people.”

The instigator of hatred stated that nothing good could be expected from the UOC and its hierarchs, who “all work for the FSB,” “simply a priori.”

“This structure, which even dares to call itself the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, in principle despises everything Ukrainian <…>. They live here in prosperity, deny themselves nothing, send money to Moscow to support this FSB-linked structure, ultimately to wage war against Ukraine itself. That is, the bullets that fly at Ukrainian soldiers are quite literally being cast somewhere in the Sviatohirsk Lavra.”

“Against this entire background, this FSB-linked organization <…> not only demonstrates with its entire appearance that ‘we are Russians, God is with us,’ but then it turns out that this very UOC of the FSB Moscow Patriarchate is one of the main breeding grounds of coronavirus in Ukraine,” the blogger continued. “That is, it is such a nest of coronavirus, where the virus has built its altar and drenched everything around. All the senior hierarchs fell ill, and at the same time they conceal that they are ill, although this is no secret to anyone. But they lie shamelessly, which once again shows the nature of this Church of evil, a Church of lies. Lies and deceit in every step, in every word, in every movement.”

[Видео/вставка]

(Source: SPZh)

24 April 2020 — Members of Parliament from the faction “Opposition Platform — For Life” appealed to the Prosecutor General of Ukraine with a request to open a criminal case against blogger Aider Muzhdabayev for discrimination against the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.

This was reported on Facebook by one of the MPs from the faction, Oleksandr Kachnyi.

(Source: post on Oleksandr Kachnyi’s personal Facebook page)

17 August 2021 — Muzhdabayev called for the physical destruction of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church during a live broadcast on his YouTube channel.

The blogger stated that the existence of the UOC obstructs Ukraine’s “final independence.”
“There will never be final independence as long as this church physically exists here,” Muzhdabayev said. “The destruction of this church, its expulsion from Ukraine, is a matter of state security.”

The Deputy Director and host of the ATR television channel urged the Ukrainian authorities to “come up with” laws that would deprive the UOC of the possibility of existing in the country.
“It is necessary to adopt laws that make the existence of a hostile church in Ukraine impossible,” Muzhdabayev stated. “You can invent laws.”

[Видео/вставка]

(Source: SPZh)

15 July 2024 — Muzhdabayev called for taking UOC clergy hostage and using them as a pool for the exchange of prisoners of war.

Muzhdabayev stated that UOC priests are “the best exchange fund.” He shared this opinion in a video by Boryslav Bereza, commenting on the exchange with the Russian Federation of Metropolitan Ionafan, head of the Tulchyn Diocese of the UOC, for Nariman Dzhelyal, Deputy Chairman of the Mejlis.

“In the exchange involving Nariman, the main thing for me, you know what it was?” he said. “That this group of people was exchanged, among other things, for Russian priests. This is the best exchange fund. Take the same Dmytruk — let him bring his priest friends to one agreed location, some kind of prayer service for Putin or for peace, and take them all there — and then exchange them.”

Muzhdabayev explained how he envisions such an exchange scheme: arrest UOC clergy on charges of high treason and exchange them with the Russian Federation.

“They are exchanged — practice proves it — they are willingly exchanged for our prisoners,” he concluded.

[Видео/вставка]

(Source: SPZh)

24 September 2024 — A court ruled that an investigator of the Pechersk District Police Department must enter information into the Unified Register of Pre-Trial Investigations regarding a possible criminal offense under Part 1 of Article 161 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine, allegedly committed by journalist and media manager Aider Muzhdabayev. This was reported by lawyer Archpriest Nikita Chekman on his Telegram channel.

The grounds for the complaint was a video interview with Muzhdabayev on the YouTube channel “Boryslav Bereza,” published on 14 July 2024. During a discussion of the exchange of Ukrainian prisoners with Russia, Muzhdabayev stated that priests of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church are “the best exchange fund,” proposing to “arrest UOC clergy for high treason and exchange them with the Russian Federation.”

The journalist is accused of inciting religious hatred and insulting the religious feelings of citizens.

(Source: Telegram channel of lawyer Nikita Chekman)