Nestor Ivanovich Shufrych – People’s Deputy of Ukraine of III, IV, VI-IX convocations.
Place of Birth, Education
He was born on December 29, 1966 in Uzhhorod.
He received his higher education at the Faculty of History of Uzhhorod State University, which he graduated in 1992.
Career
During 1985 – 1987 he served in the military.
After demobilization, until 1988, he worked as a translator from Hungarian in a commercial and household enterprise of the Ministry of Defense of the Soviet Union.
In 1989, he took the position of adviser in the cooperative association “Retro”, and later became the commercial director of the Soviet-Austrian joint venture “Tekop”.
In 1991, he headed the Ukrainian-American enterprise “West-Contrade” as a director, and four years later became its president.
In 2021 – 2022, he was the owner of the TV channels “First Independent” and UkrLive, which had ties with Viktor Medvedchuk and were later sanctioned.
Political Activities
From 1996 to 2007 he was a member of the Social Democratic Party of Ukraine. At different times, he held the positions of deputy chairman of the Transcarpathian regional organization of the party, was a member of the political council, and also held the positions of deputy and first deputy chairman of the party.
In 1998, he became a people’s deputy of Ukraine for the first time, having entered the Verkhovna Rada from the Social Democratic Party. In parliament, he was an authorized representative of the faction.
In 1999, he became a member of the National Council on Youth Policy under the President of Ukraine.
During the elections to the Verkhovna Rada in 2002, he again nominated his candidacy in the same constituency, but could not gain the required number of votes. As a result, he became a deputy of the Transcarpathian Regional Council. A few months later, by-elections were held in the parliament and Shufrych was re-elected.
In 2004, during the presidential elections in Ukraine, he represented the candidate Viktor Yanukovych in the Central Election Commission.
In 2006, he ran for the Verkhovna Rada on the list of the electoral bloc “Opposition Bloc “Not Like That!”, but the political force did not overcome the barrier. At the same time, he was able to become a deputy of the Verkhovna Rada of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea from the same party.
In December 2006, he first joined the government, heading the Ministry of Emergency Situations and Protection of the Population from the Consequences of the Chernobyl Catastrophe in the second cabinet of Viktor Yanukovych. He held this position until December 2007.
In the fall of 2007, he again became a people’s deputy of Ukraine from the Party of Regions. During 2007 – 2014, he was a member of the political force.
In March 2010, he returned to the post of Minister of Emergency Situations, but already in the government of Mykola Azarov. In July of the same year, he left the ministry and moved to the post of Deputy Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council (NSDC), which was then headed by Raisa Bogatyryova.
In 2012 and 2014, he was again elected to the Verkhovna Rada: first under the 27th number in the list of the Party of Regions, and later under the 7th in the list of the Opposition Bloc.
In the fall of 2017, he joined the “For Life” party, which was headed by Vadym Rabinovych.
In the 2019 parliamentary elections, he ran under the 7th number on the list of the “Opposition Platform – For Life” and again became a people’s deputy. In the Verkhovna Rada of the IX convocation, the Committee on Freedom of Speech was headed.
After the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and the ban of the “Opposition Platform – For Life”, he became a member of the deputy group “Platform for Life and Peace”.
In November 2022, he became a member of the National Olympic Committee of Ukraine, but after a negative reaction from society, he quickly left it.
In September 2023, he was suspected of committing high treason, and shortly after that he was deprived of the post of chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Freedom of Speech.
Scandals
Shufrych has repeatedly been involved in scandals. During the presidential elections of 2004, he found himself in the center of a fight between representatives of the government and the opposition in the Central Election Commission (CEC). This fight was marked by footage of his naked torso, which was broadcast throughout the country.
He also took an active part in supporting his fellow party member, the former head of the Transcarpathian region, Ivan Rizak. The latter, according to him, was illegally pursued by law enforcement officers. The incident took place in one of the Uzhhorod hospitals, where Shufrych tried to prevent the detention of Rizak.
In addition, his name has repeatedly appeared in the statements of representatives of the “orange” camp, who accused him of misappropriation of elite land plots in Pushcha-Vodytsia near Kyiv and Transcarpathia, as well as illegal use of oil and gas fields.
On February 15, 2008, he again found himself in the center of a scandal, trying to prevent the transfer of the accused ex-Minister of Transport Mykola Rudkovsky from the hospital back to the pre-trial detention center, where he was placed by court decision. Together with his colleagues in the faction Volodymyr Sivkovych and Vladyslav Lukyanov, he tried to block the transportation, but the intervention of special forces thwarted these plans.
As a result, Rudkovsky was still taken to a cell, and Shufrych himself was injured – during the fight, the car that the deputies used to block the road hit his leg. After that, the politician ended up in the hospital, from where he came out in a cast and on crutches.
Criminal cases
On September 15, 2023, prosecutors of the Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine notified Shufrych of suspicion of committing high treason. According to the investigation, he collaborated with the former deputy secretary of the National Security and Defense Council, who left for Moscow in 2014 and was recruited by the Federal Security Service (FSB) of Russia. His task was to coordinate the activities of Russian agents on the territory of Ukraine.
During a search of Shufrych’s house, law enforcement officers found a document containing an autonomy plan for Donetsk and Luhansk regions, which provided for changing the name of the regions to “regions”, granting them broad autonomy, holding elections and creating separate authorities, including the government and parliament. In addition, prohibited symbols of the Soviet period were discovered, including St. George’s ribbons, medals, double-headed eagles, as well as orders. On the same day, the Pechersk District Court of Kyiv decided to arrest Shufrych for two months without the right to post bail.
On January 19, 2025, the National Security and Defense Council decided to impose ten-year sanctions on Shufrych.
Marital Status
Shufrych is married to Ekaterina Maikova, who is his third wife. The couple have three children: son Ivan and daughters Maria and Anna.
In addition, Shufrych has two sons from previous marriages: Alexander from the first and Nestor from the second.
