The Ministry of Economy is preparing to auction off the Lysovitska area, an oil and gas field in the Carpathian foothills between Kalush and Stryi. A significant part of its territory falls within the Morshyn community, which has a number of nature conservation areas, and the auction was initiated by a company with a registered capital of 5,000 hryvnia and dubious connections.
This was reported by Lviv News Manufactory.
Oil for sale
The Lysovitsa area was included in the list of subsoil resources for which special permits for development are sold at auction. This happened at the request of the Ministry of Economy, Environment, and Agriculture. According to NADRA.INFO, this decision was signed by Deputy Minister Yegor Perelygin.
A comprehensive special permit will be put up for sale. This means a full range of works, from studying the geology of the site to the actual extraction of minerals.
Environmental context
A significant part of the Lysovychi area is located within the Morshyn community. Rich oil and gas deposits lie beneath the protected areas. These include a number of hydrological natural monuments – natural mineral water springs, in particular Magdalina and Bonifacius. There are also local nature reserves here – the Morshyn landscape reserve and the Morshyn forest reserve.
Officially, the activities of the future subsoil user are to be prohibited in certain areas. They also want to impose a number of conditions and restrictions related to the location of the deposit within the Emerald Network.
A young company and its strange connections
The auction was initiated by Flexor Invest LLC. It is registered in the capital and was founded only in February 2025. The authorized capital of the business is UAH 5,000. The first head and owner was Artur Zadoyany, who is simply a "collector" of companies — hundreds of businesses are registered under his name. However, in just a month, Flexor Invest was re-registered to Bohdan Kravchenko.
However, it is not only the inconsistency between the capital and the intention to purchase a permit to develop an entire field with reserves of 3.3 million tons of oil that causes mistrust. LMG journalists have discovered indirect links between Flexor Invest and companies involved in criminal proceedings.
In particular, Flexor's contact number coincides with the contact number of another Kyiv-based company, Europetroleum. Last year, this company attracted the attention of the Economic Security Bureau.
According to the investigation, between 2023 and 2024, the group of companies was involved in the illegal production of fuel from unknown raw materials and its sale at a number of mini-gas stations in Zakarpattia and Prykarpattia.
In addition to Europetroleum, which strangely has common contacts with the initiator of the auction for the field near Morshyn, Ami-Oil LLC is also involved in the case. Until 2016, its owner was a Russian citizen and, concurrently, a former manager of Gazprom.
EcoPolitic previously reported that a company owned by the former head of the State Service of Geology and Subsoil was involved in the illegal sand extraction in Lviv region.
Another official of the State Service of Geology and Subsoil of Ukraine facilitated illegal amber extraction in the Rivne region. The state suffered losses exceeding 350 million UAH.
