According to experts, Russia has also cracked down on Ukrainian religious communities since the beginning of the war. The new Orthodox Church in Ukraine was particularly affected, wrote the US Institute for War Studies (ISW).
Russia’s aim is to wipe out the Church in the occupied territories, which is independent of Moscow. Churches were expropriated and priests arrested arbitrarily. Church services in Ukrainian are forbidden.
Even evangelical churches affected
Protestant churches are also affected by the persecution by the occupation authorities. A law that has been in force in Russia since 2016, which only allows state-registered religious communities, serves as the legal basis.
The Orthodox Church of Ukraine was only founded in 2018 with state support. The Russian Orthodox Church, on the other hand, regards Ukraine as its sphere of influence and the Ukrainian Orthodox Church as the only legitimate one. However, the latter had also broken away from Moscow after the Russian invasion last year.
The Ukrainian Orthodox Church, in turn, has itself complained about repression by the government in Kiev. The Ukrainian state organs are raiding the church.
