In Babanly’s Name: How does the Supreme Court leadership counteract fakes?
In the context of an existential war, it is critical to preserve and strengthen statehood. Therefore, the power of the judiciary and judicial reform, which should build public trust in the courts, are crucial.
The judiciary, particularly the virtuous judges of the Supreme Court, and part of the public sector are under constant attack from sleazy Telegram channels. This was reported by Holka at the beginning of the year. The results of the study, which exposed the Kremlin’s Telegram network, were presented by the public initiative in Bonn and Brussels. And then the question arose: how does the Supreme Court counteract fakes that harm its “brand” and the reputation of its judges?
The Supreme Court has a press service that should be working on a communication strategy, and there is a court leadership that is responsible for strengthening the institutional capacity of the authority. Since the beginning of the full-scale war, a number of organizations have revised their development and communications strategies. Every state institution should do the same. The response of the Supreme Court’s press service makes it clear that there is essentially no counteraction to the communication attacks by propagandists. Instead, the leadership of the Supreme Court has turned the court’s communication network into a Soviet-style PR “in its own name.”
It is striking that in response to a request for cases of countering disinformation in 2024, the Supreme Court’s communication team cites cases that occurred four (!) years ago. This is the period before the full-scale war when the Supreme Court was headed by Valentyna Danishevska, despite the fact that the request referred to cases from the current year of 2024.
The Supreme Court’s response to the request of “Holka”
It seems that it was under the leadership of the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court that the institution took care of its reputation. Then there was the infamous Vsevolod Knyazev and now Stanislav Kravchenko, who is the subject of a finding of dishonesty.
Under the last chief justice, the Supreme Court’s news feed has changed significantly—not for the better. There are questions for both the management and the communication staff. This is despite the fact that there is now an opportunity to engage partner organizations that can provide technical assistance in countering disinformation.
Judging by the above response to the request, all Kravchenko managed to do during his term as chairman was to separate the Supreme Court from another organization in liquidation, namely the Supreme Court of Ukraine. This happened when the SBU detained a member of the Supreme Court of Ukraine in February 2024 who was justifying Russia’s armed aggression and looking forward to the full occupation of Ukraine.
Photo of the belongings of the detained employee of the Supreme Court of Ukraine from the SBU Telegram channel.
Although these “supreme courts” are different organizations on paper, the detained “expectant” worked on the premises where Kravchenko now works and could have been engaged in recruitment, not just lying in wait. Therefore, the Kremlin network’s lack of counteraction to fakes raises questions.
After February 2024, it would have been easy for the Supreme Court’s press service to identify new cases of fake news about the institution and its judges in the information space. However, the response to the request does not mention this.
Therefore, Holka monitored the Supreme Court’s Facebook news feed and found that the institution was obviously selective in countering disinformation about its judges, even recently.
On October 17 this year, information about Supreme Court Justice Yevhen Synelnikov ‘s relationship with a pedophile prosecutor from Cherkasy appeared on the Internet.
Screenshot from the ZiB website
(according to the results of Holka’s research, the Telegram channel of the publication is part of the Kremlin network that discredits judicial reform and a number of judges)
The Supreme Court responded by saying that this judge “does not know the detainee and has never had any relations with him, including ‘joint business’. In addition, Judge Yevhen Sinelnikov is not engaged in and, given the requirements of the law, is not entitled to engage in entrepreneurial activity. The judge has never exercised and does not exercise influence in criminal proceedings.”
Screenshot from the Supreme Court’s Facebook page
A natural question arises: How does the Supreme Court’s press service know who the judge knows and who he does not know, and what does he do after he leaves the court premises?
Another recent attempt by the Supreme Court to deny the negative information occurred after Bihus.info published a story about the real estate of Judge Ihor Dashutin. In response, the Supreme Court wrote that the judge himself “believes that the information provided in the story is unreliable, and the hints made about his dishonesty have no basis in fact.”
Screenshot from the Supreme Court’s Facebook page
It is good that at least they did not write that they knew about Bihus.info’s unreliability. In the case of refuting the information about Synelnikov, it looked like the Supreme Court’s leadership knew all the judge’s acquaintances and monitored all his activities outside of work.
No other, let alone successful, attempts by the Supreme Court to counteract negative information about it have been found so far. Either the court pretends not to notice the negative information, or the management and those responsible for the news feed in the Supreme Court apparatus have a selective approach to refuting negative information about individual judges.
For example, after the information about Sinelnikov, Law and Business (according to the results of the Holka research, the publication’s Telegram channel is part of the Kremlin network that discredits judicial reform and a number of judges) spread negative information about several other judges of the Civil Court of Cassation: Vladyslav Shypovych (in the article “A collaborator works in the Supreme Court – an investigative journalism piece), Natalia Sakara (in the article ‘Why did a Supreme Court judge go to the TOT and register real estate for her father-in-law – an investigative journalism piece ) and Olena Bilokon (in the article ’Supreme Court judge registers corrupt assets for relatives – an investigative journalism piece ).
The press service of the Supreme Court remained silent about Judges Shipovych, Sakara and Bilokon, but not about Judge Synelnikov. The question arises: why is there a selective approach?
The source of information in all cases is the same – Law and Business.
From the Supreme Court’s social media pages, it seems that instead of protecting independence and strengthening the institution, its apparatus has denied negative information about “elected” judges and promoted positive information about its leaders and individual judges who have negative opinions from the Public Integrity Council.
To track the information space, the press service could use the ready-made analytics prepared by the public sector, which already systematizes data. They could find what the Supreme Court “does not notice.”
For example, lawyer Rostyslav Kravets, who is a regular “visitor” to the Supreme Court, represents his clients there and regularly hits the highest judicial body, calling it “the Supreme Court of not Ukraine.” Everything is clear here because, judging by the Unified State Register of Court Decisions, visits to the Supreme Court are not often successful for Kravets. Not so long ago, in his “sincere” Russian, he wrote in his posts for three years before the full-scale invasion that there was “foreign management” during the judicial reform.
Screenshot from Rostyslav Kravets’s Telegram channel
These are typical pro-Russian narratives. Kravets is a lawyer, not pro-Ukraine, and his channel is part of the Kremlin network.
Attacks on honest judges are not uncommon on his part and on the part of anonymous Telegram channels. For example, regarding Supreme Court Judge Ivan Mischenko, who has three children and voluntarily went to the front, non-Ukrainian lawyer Rostyslav Kravets claims that he “takes an active part in the destruction of Ukraine’s independence and sovereignty.” This is despite the fact that Kravets, who supposedly supports statehood, unlike Mishchenko, did not go to the front.
Screenshot from Rostyslav Kravets’ Telegram channel
Yet, what can we say about fakes about individual judges if Kravets writes that the entire composition of the Grand Chamber of the Supreme Court has once again allegedly committed treason? And the leadership of the Supreme Court does not care about this and other unethical behavior of the lawyer. They say let him continue to spread nonsense, undermining the authority of the highest court of Ukraine and at the same time representing the interests of clients in this court. The Supreme Court does not have time to appeal to the Qualification and Disciplinary Commission of the Bar and the High Council of Justice on this issue.
Screenshot from Rostyslav Kravets’s Telegram channel
Similar fakes were spread on Telegram channels recently when the competition for the position of a member of the High Qualification Commission of Judges of Ukraine began. In early August, they wrote that the winner of the selection had already been determined. According to the anonymous channel “Pod Mantiey (Under the Mantle)”, it was supposed to be Supreme Court judge Dmytro Hudyma. But the “predictions” did not come true.
Screenshot from the Telegram channel “Under the Mantle”
“Under the Mantle,” wrote that $700,000 was allegedly seized from Judge Hudyma during a search in the Knyazev case. It doesn’t take a great expert to realize that if this had happened, the judge would have suffered the fate of Knyazev himself, and this information would have become public in a year. The same information about $700,000 was spread by a non-Ukrainian lawyer, Kravets.
Similarly, one does not need to be a computer expert to understand, by comparing data from the Judiciary of Ukraine portal and the Unified State Register of Court Decisions, that Judge Gudyma did not appeal the seizure of his funds to the High Anti-Corruption Court. That is why this court has not made any decisions regarding non-existent complaints.
The Supreme Court’s press service is not interested in countering such disinformation, which could potentially affect the selection procedures. In response to the request, the latter provides examples of the fight against fakes in 2020. The response shows that the press service monitors Telegram channels. But why if there are no further actions?
“At the same time, we would like to inform you that the data on cases of spreading disinformation about the activities of the Supreme Court and its judges are not systematized, and therefore, we cannot provide accurate and detailed information on their number,” the response says.
And despite this, citing archaic facts from 2020 and acknowledging the lack of a systematic approach, the response convinces us that “identifying and refuting false information is part of the Supreme Court’s communication activities.”
However, what the press service has time for is creating portraits of the leadership for the Facebook page or making a series of Instagram posts with their photos.
It is now possible to say exactly what is included in the Supreme Court’s communication activities. This institution’s Instagram page can easily be confused with Rasim Babanla’s personal page, which is the personal page of the Supreme Court’s First Deputy Chief of Staff and Head of the Department of Analytical and Legal Work.
Screenshot from the Supreme Court’s Instagram page
Babanly is positioned as an analyst who “managed to combine artificial intelligence with justice”. So, AI could help in monitoring fakes that are spread about the work of the Supreme Court and Supreme Court judges. Still, as we can clearly see, this is not part of the communication strategy of the highest judicial body. Today, it is more focused on showing the First Deputy Chief of Staff of the Supreme Court.
Judging by the intensity of the posts, he may be being prepared either to replace Viktor Kapustynskyi as Chief of Staff (the most influential position in the Supreme Court after the Chief Justice) or to take on the mantle during the next competition for the position of Supreme Court judge.
Screenshot from the Instagram page justgroup.com.ua
To enhance the “effect,” clerks like Rasim Babanly and his supervisor, Viktor Kapustinsky, immortalize themselves in painted portraits and support this “team” creativity with “likes” on the Supreme Court’s page.
Screenshot from the Supreme Court’s Facebook page
The Supreme Court press service cannot exist independently without control from above. Its work is influenced by Chief Justice Stanislav Kravchenko, in addition to Babanla. Probably, the heads of the cassation courts Mykhailo Smokovych, Larysa Rohach, Oleksandr Marchuk, Borys Gulko, the secretary of the Grand Chamber Vitaliy Urkevych, and the permanent secretary of the Supreme Court Plenum Dmytro Luspenyk also retain some possibilities for information flow.
However, Kravchenko is definitely not someone who will strengthen the Supreme Court’s brand in the public sphere. Just look at his appearance in the press before the first instance court hearing in the case of the Russian citizenship of former Supreme Court Justice Bohdan Lviv. Kravchenko gave an essentially formative interview before the court session, where he said that Lviv’s dismissal was “Knyazev’s subjective position.” It seemed that in this way, the head of the highest court was trying to influence the court’s decision. And for some reason, no ethics or Bangalore Principles applicable to judges stopped Kravchenko then.
It is worth mentioning here that Supreme Court judges have contributed to cleansing the judicial branch of power from Lviv – Viktor Propok and Olena Kibenko. The discovered network of Kremlin Telegram channels is also working against them. But you won’t read about this in the press service of the Supreme Court. Therefore, a logical question arises: why is Babanla’s PR more important than countering hostile fakes that harm the Supreme Court as an institution?
Screenshot from Rostyslav Kravets’s channel, where judges Kibenko, Tkachuk, Hudyma, and Propok are mentioned
During his long tenure, Kravchenko should have organized the press service work. Since his election, it has “broken down” because even in times of war, there is no real strategy here except for self-promotion. Therefore, it is most likely not worth complaining about appeals to the High Council of Justice, the Security Service of Ukraine, and the current Supreme Court’s real counteraction to fakes.
Holka has requested the Supreme Court to provide a copy of the government body’s current communication strategy and, in case of its absence, inform whether there is an intention to develop and approve it.
Based on the materials of Channel 24
