The owner of the Telegram channel "Joker" has deregistered from military service while being abroad.

The owner of the Telegram channel "Joker" and the 153rd candidate on the electoral list of the "Servant of the People" party, Roman Kravets, traveled abroad eight times during the full-scale invasion. Previously, the 29-year-old claimed he crossed the border as a volunteer through the "Shlyakh" system, but by the summer of 2024, he had obtained a so-called "white ticket," exempting him from military service. This information is mentioned in an investigation by hromadske, published on November 20.

Until June 2024, Roman Kravets traveled abroad five times, and then three more times afterward. His last trip abroad lasted from September 22 to October 3, 2024.

According to hromadske, Kravets and 23-year-old blogger Ulyana Melnyk stayed at the five-star Shangri-La Paris hotel. The cost of the cheapest room is $2,000 per night, while a luxury suite costs from $6,500. In Paris, the couple visited boutiques before heading to Vienna.

On September 26, Kravets was seen in the company of Kyiv businessman Seyar Kurshutov and former head of the President's Office Andriy Bohdan at the bar of the Ritz hotel in Vienna. In 2021, Kurshutov was added to the sanctions list of the National Security and Defense Council for smuggling, and in September 2022, he was stripped of Ukrainian citizenship. Russian databases contain an individual tax number and passport for a person with the same name and birth date as Seyar Kurshutov. The businessman denies having Russian citizenship.

According to hromadske, Kurshutov controls the Telegram channel "Dark Knight," which published the first part of hromadske's investigation into "Joker" with derogatory comments about Kravets in June 2024. Later, the posts disappeared, and Seyar Kurshutov stated that he has a friendly relationship with Roman Kravets.

Kurshutov also mentioned that he is a close friend of Andriy Bohdan. They were together in Vienna and decided to invite Kravets to their meeting. During the gathering, the company allegedly discussed businessman Hennadiy Korban. In contrast, Bohdan and Kravets claimed that the conversation was about "corrupt journalists."

Roman Kravets traveled abroad thanks to the "white ticket," which he received in the summer. On July 16, 2024, the Holosiivskyi District Territorial Center for Recruitment and Social Support removed Kravets from military registration. hromadske adds that on October 24, the DBR conducted a search at this TCC and seized over $1.2 million in cash from its employees. Three employees are currently suspected of aiding thousands of conscripts in evading mobilization.

Journalists note that from June 20 to July 20, Kravets was abroad, and his signature on the RTC document does not match his signature on the apartment purchase agreement in Dnipro in early 2023. Kravets claimed that he did not buy that apartment and that his signature was forged. Later, Roman Kravets provided hromadske with a photo from a hospital, allegedly showing his medical commission. However, this was not in July, but on May 29.

Journalists point out that shortly before the investigation's release, the Telegram channel "Dark Knight" ceased to exist, and the Joker channel became private.

Recall that in June it became known that the owner of the Telegram channel "Joker" is the 29-year-old Roman Kravets, a candidate for deputy from the "Servant of the People" party in the 2019 elections to the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine. The main income of the owner of "Joker" comes from media attacks against government critics. Journalists noted that Kravets spent over 8 million UAH on luxury cars during the two years of the full-scale war, lives in an elite residential complex in the center of Kyiv, utilizes security services, and has traveled abroad multiple times without substantial reasons.