Climate disinformation peddlers target the Vatican and US Congress

This September, a local dance school for kids in Brezno, a small town in central Slovakia, held an open house for the public. Children were given balloons with the school’s logos before the juniors’ performances.

A lone balloon in the reception area stood out. Its logo consisted of a figure eight inside a triangle, placed in a circle.

For those intrigued, business cards with the same logo were placed above the nearby shoe cabinet. The logo belongs to Creative Society, a global activist project of the AllatRa movement which denies that human activity is the primary cause of global warming. 

Last year, the Slovak Interior Ministry warned about Creative Society on its Facebook page and advised citizens to pay maximum attention if they come across it. “Remember this logo and avoid it. We are tracking the impact of a hybrid threat that shows the signs of a cult,” they warned.

Organizations whose activities are based on manipulative techniques, the dissemination of conspiracy theories and disinformation present a risk to Slovak society, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry told ICJK in an interview in September.

Yet, the dance school, led by a Creative Society volunteer Lenka Špiriakova, embedded the project’s logo and one of its apocalyptic videos on its website. At the open house event, she spoke about the importance of teaching children moral values and then introduced a song performance. 

The lyrics, written by another volunteer, urged, “A world where hunger and war do not exist. A world that knows no thirst. A world where everyone moves forward. A world where no one looks back.”

Creative Society believes the world will end in 12 years, and only its volunteers can save it and remake it into one without wars and hunger.

ICJK emailed Špiriakova detailed questions about whether it was appropriate to use the logo, flagged by Slovak authorities as a hybrid threat, in areas where children were present, and to teach them a song that apparently supports the tenets of Creative Society. She didn’t respond.

AllatRa’s leadership claimed in an official filing in the US that the movement is a “membership association that engages in geo-physical analysis of the impact of climate change upon the earth.” Actually, it is engaged in active promotion and dissemination of climate disinformation around the world.

The project promises its members millions of dollars in the future but doesn’t seem to have viable financial backing despite at least 21 connected companies that currently push its agenda around the world. Some of these companies, in countries like Moldova, Bulgaria and the Czech Republic, have reported zero income or never filed financial reports.

Regardless of its denial of human-centric climate change, and its curious financial promises AllatRa scored a papal audience this year. It also paid a lobbyist to convince the US Congress that it is not a cult, following Russian and Ukrainian authorities denouncements of the movement as a “religious cult” in 2023.

The lobbyist, Allen Egon Cholakian, is presented in Creative Society materials as a “CERN scientist,” but CERN press office told Oštro they have never heard of him.

On his LinkedIn profile, he also goes by “former White House lobbyist” but the official register shows that he had never been registered as a lobbyist in the US prior to this year. The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

Healing the world

AllatRa was established in 2014 in Ukraine by Lagoda, a personal development center, and the AllatRa publishing house. Initially, its main activity was to promote a book series by one Anastasia Novykh. The books promised readers “unique scientific evidence of the existence of the soul” and “exclusive information about self-knowledge and secrets hidden from society.”

But Firehose of Falsehood partners found no evidence that ‘Novykh’ actually exists, while the copyright for several of her books is actually owned by Halyna Yablochkina, the founder of AllatRa publishing house. 

AllatRa also established a namesake online TV outlet, as well as companies or associations in several countries, including Russia, Cyprus, Belarus, the Czech Republic, Moldova, Bulgaria, Slovakia, and the US. Its website states that the head office is in Atlanta. 

Creative Society was born in 2019, at AllatRa’s online conference titled Society. The Last Chance. At a later summit in Prague, the president of Creative Society USA, Olga Schmidt, described it as a volunteer-based, international, independent, non-political, and non-religious project that draws attention to the climate crisis, explores causes, and finds solutions.

Cholakian, who also spoke at the Prague summit, stated that their mission was twofold — protection of democracy and “getting information out about volcanoes and so forth and climate change”.

Creative Society’s website claims that it works with volunteers from more than 180 countries and that its online conferences have been translated into over 150 languages. It states that the project is entirely funded by volunteers and has no “bank accounts, finance or property, does not accumulate funds, and does not make any profit.”

The project promises its members that, in the future, every person will have as a birthright to a monthly universal basic income, free housing, free healthcare and education worldwide, cancellation of all debts and loans, and abolition of individual taxes.

Last year at the project’s International Online Forum, Schmidt had promised each volunteer between 1 and 5 million dollars as a reward for their engagement. She didn’t respond to reporters’ questions.

According to Igor Danilov, who is considered the movement’s ‘guru’ by some academic researchers, the goal is to “build a creative society, free from the system of consumerist mindsets.” This transition to a “creative society” will happen in three stages over five to six years.

First, volunteers will be encouraged to spread the findings of Creative Society as widely as possible. This will be followed by the formation of political parties with a shared ideology, coordinated by AllatRa. Finally, humanity will “adopt a creative model of development as the only acceptable and crucial for the survival of humankind” through a global referendum to rapidly and peacefully advance to a new stage of evolutionary development.

Neither Danilov nor Creative Society representatives replied to requests for comment.

Polluting information sources

While Creative Society does not deny human effects on climate change, it argues that the most severe consequence of human activity is the rising ocean temperatures, which are now so high that they can no longer cool the Earth’s core.

This, they say, will lead to increased seismic activity that will rupture the Mariana Trench in the Pacific Ocean, causing billions of cubic meters of water to come into contact with magma, followed by a massive explosion, loss of atmosphere, oceans, and the magnetic field.

“There is absolutely no connection between seismic activity and climate change,” Howard Diamond, a climate science program manager at the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Air Resources Laboratory, told Oštro.

The oceans are warming as a result of climate change, but the idea that waters of 1°C can cool the earth’s mantle, which has temperatures in the range of 3700°C, is ridiculous, Diamond said. He’s never heard of the Mariana Trench rupture theory: “The oceans do not interact with the mantle as described by these folks – whomever they are.”

The geological institute of Slovenia pointed out to Oštro that theories about seismic events resulting in the loss of atmosphere or stopping of the Earth’s rotation “are meaningless.”

Creative Society appears to spread its propaganda via some volunteers, and is very active on social media. Several of its online claims, and those of its volunteers, have been found false by fact-checking organizations who adhere to the International Fact-Checking Network’s ethics code.

In total, Firehose of Falsehoods partners identified 275 TikTok accounts across 41 countries that disseminate Creative Society content. Together, they published over 83,000 videos that were viewed almost 2 billion times.

Context.ro developed an artificial intelligence-based tool to detect disinformation in videos posted by 227 connected accounts in Russian, English, Slovak, Hungarian, and other languages. The tool analyzed more than 54,000 video posts by AllatRa, Creative Society and connected accounts. Almost a third contained disinformation.

Czech sociologist Vojtěch Pecka, who focuses on climate disinformation, told Czech Centre for Investigative Journalism that the way Creative Society talks about the climate is specific.

Pecka said most Czech climate disinformation tends to downplay the risk of a climate crisis while Creative Society is alarmist in its rhetoric. Its strategy inspires legitimate anxiety about climate change, but they push that fear into “an immediate existential hysteria while diverting attention to entirely imaginary solutions”.

 The project told BBC in 2022 that they are a platform for all ideas to be expressed.

“Project Russia”

Last year, Russia’s Prosecutor General’s Office designated the activities of AllatRa and its Creative Society as “undesirable.” They found that AllatRa is a “pseudo-religious” movement, engaged in alleged missionary activities without the status of a religious organization, while Creative Society is a front for its political activities.

Three months after the Russian designation, the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) and National Police closed down AllatRa in Ukraine, labeling it a “religious sect”. In contrast to Russian authorities, the SBU found that AllatRa’s missionaries justified the armed aggression of Russia against Ukraine and promoted the idea of a “union of Slavic peoples” under Moscow’s leadership.

In a raid of AllatRa’s Ukrainian offices, the SBU seized weapons, passports and books by ‘Anastasia Novykh’. “The content of these books and other materials disseminated by the organization aligned with Russian geopolitical interests, idealizing the Soviet Union and downplaying the crimes of the communist regime,” the Ukrainian National Police found.

SBU also found books from the series “Project Russia” by Yuri Shalyganov in the offices. According to a 2018 scientific paper published by a Johns Hopkins University journal, the books advocate against democracies and idolize Soviet Russia, asserting that Vladimir Putin’s regime is its successor.

Court documents show that Ukrainian police are investigating six individuals, including Igor Danilov, on suspicion of committing high treason, participating in a criminal organization and undermining national security.

The authorities believe that the group distributed over 1.7 million books by ‘Anastasia Novykh’ which they suspect was Yablochkina’s pseudonym.

According to court records, Danilov began undermining Ukraine’s statehood and promoting Russian propaganda as early as 2002. One of the characters in the ‘Novykh’ books – trained by the KGB and executing tasks for Russian intelligence – was apparently modeled after him.

Despite multiple summonses, Danilov never appeared for questioning by Ukrainian authorities which issued a warrant for his arrest in December 2023, and later named him an internationally wanted person.

Yablochkina didn’t reply to a request for comment.

Pro-Putin rhetorics

In a 2016 research paper, Konstantyn Moskalyuk, an associate professor at the Kyiv Theological Academy who studied the teachings and activities of AllatRa and found it had the characteristics of a cult, identified that the movement had a guru, Danilov, who is “allegedly an extraordinary spiritual being and a prophet.” If one meditates or prays at the set times Danilov meditates, they can declare themselves a spiritual entity, followers believe.

Moskalyuk’s paper also shows that AllatRa spread its ideology in public schools and hospitals under the guise of social projects. He found that in 2015 the movement held lessons in kindness for a Ukrainian elementary school and an “Introduction to the profession” event for young employees of a hospital in Sumy in northeastern Ukraine.

By comparing some features of Danilov’s language and his use of words, he found an indirect indication that the author or co-author of the ‘Novykh’ books could be none other than Danilov.

“It is a conspiracy theory of a spiritual nature with an obscure background that has spawned a cult,” Luigi Corvaglia, co-chair of criminology and forensic medicine at the University of Salento in Lecce and member of the European Federation of Centers of Research and Information on Sectarianism (Fecris) board, told Oštro. 

He found it cult-like because of the presence of a leader; the use of founding texts; and a theory of the end of the world involving an apocalypse with volcanic explosions and doom, in which only a world united under Creative Society will save humanity.

Corvaglia said that several of ‘Novykh’ books feature Nomo, a character seemingly modeled after Russian president Putin. Nomo is presented as the savior of the pan-Slavic civilization in its battle with Western materialism: “pro-Putin rhetoric is evident.”

Eva Hronová, a former AllatRa coordinator and video translator from the Czech Republic, told a researcher from the Charles University in Prague that the movement openly discussed similarities between Nomo and Putin after the publication of a ‘Novykh’ book.

“It was an open secret,” she said. Today, she sees the movement as anti-system in the sense of opposing “the elite, the one percent that controls us.” 

Saving face

When Russian and Ukrainian authorities started proceedings against AllatRa, Allen Egon Cholakian, one of its key members, labeled the actions “conspiratorial practices” and announced plans to fight back against AllatRa being labeled as a religious cult.

He also accused Fecris, Russian security services, and the Moscow Patriarchate of being part of this conspiracy.

This May, at an AllatRa summit in Prague attended by some 500 people, Cholakian told the crowd that he was lobbying to establish the movement’s presence on the international stage and to engage in “anti-cult activities” in the US Congress.

“We are now developing allies, a force,” he announced. Then he went to work.

In June, Maryna Ovtsynova, the president of AllatRa International Public Movement and vice-president of Creative Society USA, officially asked Cholakian to register as a foreign agent in the United States on behalf of AllatRa. The following day, Cholakian dutifully registered as such with the US Department of Justice.

While registering, Cholakian listed AllatRa’s annual budget for the preparation and dissemination of materials as $150,000 dollars and explained that his annual fee was $8,000 dollars, FARA records show. He wrote that his aim as a lobbyist was to focus on “lifting the ‘religious cult’ designation imposed on AllatRa by Ukrainian and Russian Governments.”

According to US foreign agent registration rules, religious or scientific pursuits are exempt from registration.

Also in June, Ovtsynova and Cholakian participated at a conference in the Vatican hosted by a local non-profit, Centesimus Annus Pro Pontifice Foundation (CAPP) that promotes the Catholic Church’s social teachings in society. It was established in 1993 by Pope John Paul II.

At the conference, they met Pope Francis. Ovtsynova handed him Creative Society’s climate report which predicts that the world will end in 2036. 

After the meeting, AllatRa claimed on Facebook that Ovtsynova and the movement received the Pope’s support, and that Cholakian is a member of CAPP. According to the bylaws of CAPP in the US, each member has to come recommended by a Roman Catholic priest.

The Vatican didn’t reply to a request for comment. Neither did CAPP, its US chapter or Ovtsynova.

In July, Cholakian registered as a lobbyist with the US Congress for the purpose of “emergency planning needs, due to the civil and national security impact of earth’s irreparable geophysical condition,” advanced research of geophysical occurrences — and for the protection of AllatRa’s scientists and volunteers from hostile foreign governments.

He planned to identify “elected officials who actively monitor US-Russian foreign policy matters.”

This November, Robby Wells, one of AllatRa and Creative Society’s supporters since their inception, is running for a seat in the US House of Representatives. He is a former football coach from Virginia who presents himself a foreign correspondent of Russia Today, and believes the AllatRa’s project is the world’s only salvation.

Cholakian too is publicly vocal about the purpose of Allatra. “Our planet is on the brink of self-destruction, and humanity has only a few years left to prevent the impending catastrophe,” he said in a recorded call to the scientific community where he also spoke about the Mariana Trench rupture theory.

Cholakian and Wells didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Running on pennies

While Creative Society claims it receives no external funding, archived versions of its website show that the project had over 160 partners between 2021 and 2023. This list of partners who “actively participate in the Creative Society project” has since been deleted from the website but several of them still display the project’s visuals on their own websites.

One such partner was a company owned by a member of the Czech branch of Allatra, Radovan Galmus. He also runs an e-shop that sells Creative Society clothing, books, backpacks and other accessories. Galmus didn’t respond to questions sent by the Czech Centre for Investigative Journalism.

ICJK reporters identified 17 Slovak companies that have supported Creative Society, including the dance school for kids in Brezno. Others included a travel agency, an organic products e-shop, a bicycle shop, a publishing house and a fitness center.

In Slovenia, a Creative Society volunteer held mindfulness workshops in two high schools. “I would simply recommend to the young and not so young, laymen and experts, everybody who is interested in people, society, happiness and life, to read the works of Anastasia Novykh,” he told a student from one of those schools who was writing a research paper.

“These books are a gold mine of primordial knowledge, presented in an understandable and pleasing way. This knowledge is at this very moment changing lives and connecting people all over the world on the basis of finding the best in each one of us,” he concluded.

The ‘Novykh’ book sales, as well as their local variants, may be one of the few sources of financing for AllatRa and Creative Society. In Croatia, they have been promoted in at least 17 public libraries, Oštro found.

Out of the 23 connected companies analyzed by Firehose of Falsehood partners, two of which were dissolved, a publishing house in Russia reported the most significant earnings relative to the rest of the analyzed entities. Those banked only a meager income — if they didn’t report zero earnings or failed to file financial reports.

AllatRa RUS, whose main activity is selling books, totaled 182,290 euros in revenue from 2014 to 2023 (2017 to 2018 data was unavailable). The company’s archived website shows it published books by ‘Novykh’ and one by Danilov on degenerative spinal disease.

Context.ro reached out to ‘Novykh’ via the email listed on Allatra’s website but she did not respond to the request for comment.

It is unclear how much money members and volunteers have poured into AllatRa and Creative Society.

Eva Hronová, a former AllatRa coordinator, told investigace.cz that there was a dedicated bank account to which the Czech volunteers wired money to pay for rent for a local Czech office, and for various costs and promotional activities.

Many local branch contributions and donations from members were handed over in cash, mostly via two Czech individuals. The members were happy to contribute. “Everything was voluntary, but there was some pressure. They told us – the best investment is in the Creative Society.”

AllatRa and Creative Society didn’t respond to requests for comment.

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The following reporters contributed to the story: Iulia Stănoiu, Marionela Toma (Context.ro, Romania), Ana Čelar (Oštro, Croatia), Uroš Škerl Kramberger (Oštro, Slovenia), Mihaela Tănase (Context.ro).