Ministry of Culture reinstates Ostapenko as director of Lavra reserve

Ostapenko returned to the Lavra reserve. Photo: OCU

On January 15, 2026, Minister of Culture Tetiana Berezhna dismissed Svitlana Kotliarevska from her post as acting director of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra National Preserve and returned Maksym Ostapenko to the leadership – he had held this position before Kotliarevska.

The Ministry of Culture did not disclose the reasons for Kotliarevska’s dismissal. The tasks set for Ostapenko include: “restoring the work of the Reserve and supporting the team, systematic work to safeguard the heritage that is part of Ukraine’s national security. As well as strengthening the institution’s capacity and developing its scholarly and museum work.”

Kotliarevska wrote on Facebook that she is proud of her “synergy” with Dumenko: “Through insane effort and hard work, we fought to achieve a historic event – the prayer service of clergy led by Metropolitan Epifaniy in the Far Caves and later in the Near Caves, at the relics of the Venerable Fathers.”

According to her, the Reserve and the OCU “side by side carried out a set of measures to preserve the remains of the saints in the Near and Far Caves.” The official claimed that among the people this is called the “drying of the relics of the Venerable Ones.”

She also emphasized that under her leadership the Reserve “made a quantum leap and succeeded in having the court reject all baseless motions by which the UOC tried to drag out the process.”

Earlier, the UOJ wrote that after Ostapenko’s dismissal in 2025, the Ministry of Culture criticized his work at the Reserve.

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