About 1% of religious communities reregistered in Crimea,according to Ministry of Culture

In Crimea, about one percent of religious communitieshave been reregisteredunder the legislation of the Russian Federation. This was announced today during the committee hearings on “The issue of temporarily occupied territory of Crimea and Sevastopol,” Deputy Minister of Culture of Ukraine RostyslavKarandeyev, was reported as saying this by RBK-Ukraine.

"The parishes of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church Kyiv Patriarchate reduced threefold, almost all religious communities except the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate) experience pressure. The Russian government set up the term for all religious communities to undergo re-registrationuntil March 1 this year. According to our information, only about 1 percent of the regional community have done that,” said Karandeyev.

According to him, that inadequacy of Russian legislation failed to ensure rapid re-registration of religious communities.

“Unfortunately, the Russian Duma (State Duma - Ed.) made necessary amendments to the legislation, and we have to admit now there is a big wave of re-registration of religious communities,” said Deputy Minister of Culture.

Karandeyevalso noted that particular pressurewas exerted on the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Kyiv Patriarchateon the territory of Crimea.

Note that in June last year the Foreign Ministry of Ukraine accused Russia of repression against the Crimean diocese of the UOC-KP.