In March 2025, a video was spread across the Internet, allegedly released by a Ukrainian TV channel and talking about fraud surrounding donations to the needs of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. We have verified the accuracy of this information.
As described in a 30-second video with the logo of the Kiev TV channel, in 2023, Ukrainian activist Kirill Karpenko, through his project “Drones to the Front,” raised $1.2 million to help the Armed Forces of Ukraine. The following year, an estate worth $1 million on the Spanish Costa Dorada was allegedly purchased in his name. The authors of the video note that this is not the first case of such fraud, and urge people to use only verified funds.
The video went viral on social media (X, "Classmates"), as well as on Telegram, where it was published by the channels "Cat Kostyan"(164,000 views at the time of writing this analysis), Gura Anton (100,000), Borisenko Dmitriy (84,000), "Talipov Online" (46,000) and "Actually in Kharkov"(38,000).
Donations for the needs of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (in in particular, on procurement drones) play a significant role in supplying the Ukrainian army. According to survey Rakuten Viber, in 2024, almost two-thirds of Ukrainians transferred money to the military at least once, and 44% did it monthly. A year earlier, the corresponding figure was 46%.
Considering how many people are involved in this area, it has not been spared scandals. Thus, Ukrainian investigative authorities, together with their Estonian colleagues, have been are investigating case of embezzlement of €1.5 million donated by residents of the Baltic country. In 2024 in appropriation of donations suspected a volunteer of one of the Ukrainian volunteer units. These cases became known from investigative journalism or reports of victims.
“Verified” could not find any reports in the Ukrainian segment of the Network about the machinations of a volunteer named Kirill Karpenko and the scandal that followed. This applies to both authoritative media and popular blogs. The only evidence provided by Telegram channels is a video with the logo of the Kiev TV channel in the upper left corner. However, the video itself is not on the official website channel, nor in its accounts in Telegram, X, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok And Threads, and there are significant differences in the design of a viral video and a genuine one.
So, in the real videos of the TV channel on Instagram (only there you can find videos without voice-over) a white (not pink) logo is used, a different font and size, as well as highlighting one of the words with a pink background. At the same time, the vertical pink stripe along the text is not used as a design element, and the videos themselves are not released in a square format.
Some details of the video also raise doubts. Thus, the video does not contain original images, which is not typical for the content of any major TV channels. The panorama of the Spanish town of Sitges used in the video is in the public domain - for example, her use on the website of a company that supports investments in Spanish real estate. It is also not entirely clear why dollars appear in the report, since the currency of Spain is the euro.
In addition, among the variety of thematic funds currently operating in Ukraine, “Verified” did not find a single one that would bear the name “Droni na front” (“Drones to the front”). The only more or less famous Ukrainian by name Kirill Karpenko - machine gunner of the Azov regiment, who died in March 2022 during the battle for Mariupol.
The first viral video was published on March 21 at 11:34 Moscow time by the pro-Russian Telegram channel “Cat Kostyan" He's already repeatedly featured in analyzes “Verified” as the primary source of disinformation about Ukraine.
Thus, there is no evidence that the organizer of one of the fundraisers for drones for the Ukrainian Armed Forces spent the donations received on real estate in Spain. The video used as evidence was doctored, likely to reduce Ukrainians' confidence in the idea of donating funds to the military.
Cover photo: social networks
Read on topic:
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