In Kyiv, on September 25, people bid farewell to serviceman, co-founder of the UNA-UNSO, one of the leaders of the "Right Sector," and former Kremlin political prisoner Mykola Karpiuk. The defender, who spent more than five years in Russian detention, was killed while carrying out a combat mission in the Zaporizhzhia sector, UNN reports.
Details
The funeral ceremony and memorial service were held at St. Michael’s Golden-Domed Monastery. Mykola Karpiuk’s relatives, friends, fellow soldiers, and members of the public came to pay their last respects. Afterward, the funeral procession headed to Independence Square, where a citywide farewell ceremony for the activist and defender was planned.
It is known that Mykola Karpiuk will be buried at Baikove Cemetery. His widow, Olena Karpiuk, previously announced this on social media.
How Mykola Karpiuk died
Mykola Karpiuk was killed on September 19, 2026, at the age of 62. It is known that he was carrying out a combat mission in the Zaporizhzhia sector when he came under enemy fire. The injuries he sustained proved fatal.
On September 20, Karpiuk’s death was publicly reported, among others, by former Deputy Head of the Security Service of Ukraine Viktor Yahun, politician Artur Palatnyi, and civic activist Yurii Honcharenko. Yahun remembered him as a principled person who remained devoted to Ukraine despite the trials he had endured. Honcharenko said that he had spoken with Karpiuk about the history of the creation of UNSO less than a month before his death. They had plans to work together in the autumn.
Mykola Karpiuk joined the ranks of Ukraine’s defenders from the very beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022.
From civic activism to Russian imprisonment: what is known about the life of the fallen defender
Mykola Karpiuk was born on May 21, 1964, in the village of Velykyi Zhytyn in the Rivne region. After finishing school, he worked as a lathe operator at the Gazotron plant in Rivne and completed his compulsory military service. He later worked at enterprises in Rivne and as a journalist for the newspaper "Nasha Sprava." He headed the Rivne branch of the Ukrainian National Assembly and was one of the leaders and co-founders of UNA-UNSO. In 1998 and 2002, he ran for the Verkhovna Rada on the electoral lists of this political force.
In 2000–2001, he took part in the "Ukraine without Kuchma" campaign. In the case concerning the events of March 9, 2001, he was sentenced to four and a half years in prison. In 2015, the European Court of Human Rights ordered that Karpiuk be paid €3,000 in compensation for violations of his rights during the consideration of his case.
Karpiuk also took part in the Revolution of Dignity and was one of the leaders of the "Right Sector."
In March 2014, Mykola Karpiuk was detained upon entering Russia. In 2016, a Russian court sentenced him to 22.5 years in prison on charges related to the First Chechen War. Karpiuk himself denied taking part in hostilities in Chechnya. The human rights organization "Memorial" recognized him and another defendant in the case, Ukrainian national Stanislav Klykh, as political prisoners.
In September 2019, Karpiuk returned to Ukraine as part of a prisoner exchange.