State Service for Ethnopolitics assumed the role of UOC MP advocate

Yesterday's decisions of the NSDC in the religious sphere, voiced in Zelenskyy’s video address, make me hopeful and wary at the same time. The decisions are encouraging because the NSDC has finally recognized the threat to Ukraine’s national security coming from the Russian Orthodox Church. They are alarming, because the authorities' decisions will slow down, at the very least, the process of banning the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine, and, at most, will allow the preservation of the significance and role of the Moscow Church in Ukraine.

“The National Security and Defense Council instructed the Government to submit to the Verkhovna Rada a draft law on making it impossible for religious organizations affiliated with centers of influence in the Russian Federation to operate in Ukraine,” said the president.

But the corresponding draft law "On ensuring the strengthening of national security in the sphere of freedom of conscience and activities of religious organizations" (No. 8221) has already been registered in the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine. It was supported by MPs of various factions, so it can be adopted in the shortest possible time.

Our draft law provides for:

• a ban on the activities of the Russian Orthodox Church, religious organizations (associations) that directly or as constituent parts of another religious organization (association) are included in the structure (are part of) the Russian Orthodox Church, as well as religious centers (management), which are part of or recognize (declare) in any form subordination in canonical, organizational, and other matters to the Russian Orthodox Church;

• all transactions related to the use of the property (rent, hiring, leasing, etc.), the validity period of which has not expired, concluded between residents of Ukraine and the banned foreign religious organization, as well as with legal entities, in which the organization acts as the owner, participant, shareholder, are terminated prematurely;

• establishing title rules for religious organizations. In particular, using the word "Orthodox" in its name (both full and abbreviated) by a religious organization may be possible only if this religious organization is subordinate in canonical and organizational matters to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine.

More than 25,000 Ukrainians signed a petition to the President of Ukraine urging him to support draft law No. 8221. The signatures were collected in less than three days. It shows that Ukrainian society expects quick decisions from the parliament and the president and not delay the process.

All the conditions for the first reading, quick processing in the parliament’s committee, final adoption of the law and signing by the president are set.

In this situation, the decision to instruct the government to develop a new draft law cannot be evaluated otherwise than as an obstacle to the process of quick decision-making in the basic interests of national security, freedom of conscience and religion.

Other decisions of the National Security Council are alarming the most:

Commissioning the State Service for Ethnopolitics and Freedom of Conscience "to ensure the religious examination of the Management Statute of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church for the presence of a church-canonical connection with the Moscow Patriarchate and, if necessary, to take measures provided for by law.”

At the same time, the NSDC stated that it is necessary to "increase the status and power of the State Service for Ethnopolitics and Freedom of Conscience."

In the process of preparing draft law No. 8221, I appealed to the State Service for Ethnopolitics and Freedom of Conscience with a parliamentary request for clarification of a number of issues regarding the activities of the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine and the Management Statute of the UOC MP, which was amended by the Council of this religious association on May 27 of this year.

The responses I received demonstrated that the State Service of Ukraine for Ethnopolitics had assumed the role of the “Moscow Church’s advocate”, going against the law and basic national security interests during Russia's full-scale war against Ukraine.

The scope of this article does not allow for a broader argument (I will do it elsewhere). However, the main conclusions can be presented in several points:

1. The State Service for Ethnopolitics and Freedom of Conscience violated its Statute and the law on Freedom of Conscience and Religious Organizations the Ukrainian Orthodox Church by refusing to register changes to the Management Statute of the UOC MP, imperatively stating that the UOC MP "severed" organizational ties with the Russian Orthodox Church. Although this is not true, as all authoritative Ukrainian religious scholars say.

2. Thus, it is already clear what the conclusions of the service’s "religious examination" will look like. And that is why the question must be addressed to the NSDC: why does the state body, supposed to ensure national security and defense, authorize the illegal activity of the central executive body, responsible for policy in the sphere of freedom of conscience and religious organizations?

3. The refusal to register changes to the Management Statute of the UOC MP allowed the service to avoid the implementation of one of the norms of its Regulations: to ensure "conducting a religious examination of the statutes of religious organizations with the participation of their representatives, representatives of academic institutions, religious scholars and other specialists." But instead of a reprimand from the NSDC, the service received approval for its activities and assurances about increasing its power.

4. In its argumentation regarding today's status of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of Ukraine and its continuation as part of the Russian Orthodox Church, the service not only violated the legislation but also provided false information to the government and parliament regarding Ukraine's international obligations in the field of freedom of conscience, the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights and the legislation of other European states.

I would like to note that in my long parliamentary practice I have not yet come across a similar case.

The former President of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, together with the parliament of the previous convocation, carried out a great deal of work on regulating Ukrainian Orthodoxy. Their work was marked as complete by receiving on January 6, 2019 the Tomos that officially recognized and established the Orthodox Church of Ukraine and granted it autocephaly.

Everything was done taking into account the necessity to protect freedom of conscience and religious organizations and to protect the Ukrainian Orthodoxy from the influence of the Russian Orthodox Church, which lost the character of a religious organization, becoming part of the state structure of the aggressor country. And also taking into account the need to protect Ukraine's national interests in the face of aggression from the Russian Federation and the need for the development of the Ukrainian nation, our historical identity and national traditions. This is fixed in laws and other legal acts.

Following February 24, now it is necessary to continue this work, and therefore to ban the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine.

Before yesterday's meeting of the NSDC, Volodymyr Zelenskyy had asked for advice from Prof. Viktor Yelenskyy a famous religious scholar and former MP of Ukraine.

This gives hope that the current state policy regarding the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine, implemented by the State Service for Ethnopolitics and Freedom of Conscience, will undergo a fundamental change.

Source

About the author: Mykola Knyazhytskyi, Ukrainian MP, journalist.

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