The murder of Pavlo Sheremet: why, 10 years on, there has been no verdict
ThePublic has reconstructed the timeline of the case ahead of the tenth anniversary of the journalist’s death. The information regarding the course of the trial is corroborated by open sources.
How Pavlo Sheremet was killed
Pavlo Sheremet was killed on the morning of 20 July 2016. At around 7.45 am, the Subaru XV in which the journalist was travelling to the morning broadcast on Radio Visti exploded.
The car belonged to Olena Prytula, co-founder of ‘Ukrainska Pravda’. The explosion took place at the junction of Bohdan Khmelnytskyi Street and Ivan Franko Street in Kyiv.
The explosive device had been planted under the car’s underbody in advance. Sheremet died from his injuries shortly after the explosion. The journalist was 44 years old.
Law enforcement agencies have opened a criminal case under the article on intentional murder committed in a manner endangering the lives of many people. Foreign experts were brought in to assist with the investigation.
Who is accused of the murder
In December 2019, law enforcement officers arrested musician and veteran Andriy Antonenko, paediatric cardiac surgeon and volunteer Yulia Kuzmenko, and military medic Yana Dugary.
According to the prosecution, unidentified individuals organised the murder; Antonenko and Kuzmenko planted the explosives, whilst Dugary gathered information about the area and the location of CCTV cameras.
They are charged with murder committed by a group of individuals using dangerous methods, unlawful handling of explosive devices, and wilful damage to property.
All three deny any involvement in the crime. They are presumed innocent until proven guilty by the court.
The defendants’ defence lawyers have pointed to inconsistencies in the identification procedures, the existence of alibis and a lack of evidence directly linking Antonenko, Kuzmenko and Dugary to the manufacture and planting of the explosives.
Why the trial had to start afresh
The trial in case No. 761/25689/20 began in 2020. Over the course of nearly three years, the court managed to examine most of the written evidence and video recordings, but had not yet proceeded to question approximately 270 witnesses.
In June 2023, two jurors had to be replaced. One of them was called up for military service, whilst the other juror had left Ukraine.
Due to the change in the jury’s composition, the court had to restart the proceedings. All the evidence previously examined had to be heard again.
On 24 January 2024, the Shevchenkivskyi District Court of Kyiv suspended proceedings at the request of the defence lawyers. Andrii Antonenko and Yana Dugary were serving in the military and carrying out combat missions, and were therefore unable to attend the hearings on a regular basis.
The most recent publicly confirmed decision in the case remains the suspension of the trial. No verdict has been handed down regarding Antonenko, Kuzmenko and Dugary.
What is known about those who ordered the murder
In May 2020, the case files relating to Antonenko, Kuzmenko and Dugary were separated into a separate set of proceedings. Following this, the pre-trial investigation into the alleged perpetrators was declared complete.
In the separate proceedings, investigators were tasked with identifying the possible organisers and instigators. In the indictment, they were referred to as unidentified individuals.
For ten years, the police have not disclosed who ordered the murder of Pavlo Sheremet. Nor have they publicly announced any suspects regarding the possible organisers.
Who was near Sheremet’s home?
In 2017, journalists from ‘Slidstvo.Info’ and the international organisation OCCRP published an independent investigation entitled ‘Who Killed Pavlo?’.
They identified Igor Ustymenko in CCTV footage. According to the investigators, he worked for the Security Service of Ukraine until at least 2014.
Ustimenko was near Sheremet’s house for several hours on the night the car was booby-trapped. CCTV cameras also captured the car he was using.
The presence of a former SBU employee near the house does not prove his involvement in the crime. However, the law enforcement agencies did not initially disclose this fact publicly. The authors of the journalistic investigation considered it important to verify.
A recording featuring the voice of the former head of the Belarusian KGB
In early 2021, Igor Makar, a former employee of the Belarusian security services, provided journalists with a recording of a conversation which, according to him, took place in 2012.
The participants in the conversation discussed the possible murders of opponents of Alexander Lukashenko’s regime. Among those mentioned were Pavel Sheremet and the possibility of him being blown up.
Makar claimed that one of the participants in the conversation was the then head of the Belarusian KGB, Vadim Zaitsev.
Forensic experts, commissioned by the ‘Nastoyashchee Vremya’ television channel, compared the recording with Zaitsev’s public speeches. They established that the voices matched.
This analysis was commissioned by the television channel. The Ukrainian police separately submitted the recording for phonoscopic analysis, but the results were not made public.
Igor Makar travelled to Kyiv and gave evidence to Ukrainian investigators. The Ministry of Internal Affairs stated at the time that the information obtained could help identify the organisers and instigators of the crime.
What former Belarusian security officials said
In July 2025, BYPOL, an association of former Belarusian security officials, published a report on the alleged involvement of Alexander Lukashenko and the Belarusian KGB in Sheremet’s murder.
The authors named possible participants in the operation and compared them with people captured on CCTV near the journalist’s car. BYPOL’s information is based on the testimony of an unnamed former employee of the Belarusian security services.
There has been no public confirmation of these claims from Ukrainian law enforcement agencies.
The theory of a Russian link
In 2022, a former Russian intelligence officer, Alexander Lysenkov, claimed that Sheremet’s murder had allegedly been organised by Russia’s FSB. He did not produce any evidence that could be independently verified.
In 2024, Ukraine’s former Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko also spoke of a possible Russian link. These statements did not alter the course of the court case and did not form part of the official findings of the investigation.
Who was Pavel Sheremet?
Pavel Sheremet was born on 28 November 1971 in Minsk. He worked for Belarusian and Russian media outlets, headed the Belarusian bureau of the ORT television channel, and was persecuted by the Lukashenko regime.
In 1997, Belarusian law enforcement officers detained Sheremet following a television report on the lack of security along the Belarusian-Lithuanian border. The journalist was given a suspended sentence.
From 2012, Sheremet worked in Ukraine. He was executive director of ‘Ukrainska Pravda’, collaborated with TVi and Channel 24, and hosted a morning programme on Radio Visti.
In 2002, Pavel Sheremet received the OSCE Award for the defence of democracy and human rights in journalism. He was buried on 23 July 2016 at the Northern Cemetery near Minsk.
Ten years after the murder, the court has yet to deliver a verdict. The three defendants deny the charges, the instigators have not been identified, and neither the Belarusian nor the Russian versions of events have been publicly corroborated by the Ukrainian investigation.
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