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UN prohibits Russian occupants to evict the OCU community from their church in Simferopol

10.09.2019, 11:52
UN prohibits Russian occupants to evict the OCU community from their church in Simferopol - фото 1
The UN Human Rights Committee has banned Russia to evict the OCU community from their temple in occupied Simferopol. An expert of the Regional Center for Human Rights Serhiy Zaets wrote about it on Facebook, UNIAN reports.

The UN Human Rights Committee has banned Russia to evict the OCU community from their temple in occupied Simferopol. An expert of the Regional Center for Human Rights Serhiy Zaets wrote about it on Facebook, UNIAN reports.

“Almost the last temple of the OCU in Crimea was on the verge of destruction in the summer of 2019. Unexpectedly for the Russian authorities, the UN human rights Committee spoke in defence of the parishioners. Not to evict the community from the temple in Simferopol – that is what the Committee demands from Russia,” he wrote.

He recalled that at the end of August, more than 50 faithful of the OCU in Crimea filed a complaint with the UN human rights Committee against persecution by the occupation authorities.

“Now Russia will be held liable for its behavior. The most interesting thing is that in the near future Russia will have to report on the observance of human rights to the UN bodies in a broader context. And this is fraught serious reputational losses,” the expert added.

On June 8, the “Arbitration Court” of Crimea decided to terminate the lease agreement, which was concluded with the Crimean Diocese of the UOC-KP before the occupation. The “court’ ordered that the Church return the premises to the “Ministry of Property and Land Relations” of Crimea and levy a charge of RUR 12 thousand to the budget of the Russian Federation. The reason for the termination of the agreement was the debt in the amount of UAH 2.3.

On July 24, the Cathedral of Sts. Volodymyr and Olha was robbed. According to Archbishop Klyment of the Crimean Diocese of OCU, all church utensils of the Crimean Diocesan Administration have been stolen from the temple. He noted that “the Minister of Property and Land Relations of Crimea, Anna Anyukhina, arranged havoc in the temple under the guise of ‘internal repair’, while Klyment was attending a conference on religious freedom in Washington.

On August 2, the occupation authorities of Crimea refused once again to register the Crimean Diocese of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine.

On August 19, the Diocesan administration of the OCU appealed against the decision of the “Arbitration Court of Crimea” on the action of the Ministry of Property and Land Relations of Crimea to terminate the agreement on lease of the Cathedral in Simferopol.

On August 29, more than 50 parishioners of the OCU in Crimea reached out to the UN human rights Committee regarding the occupation of the last temple of the Crimean diocese of the OCU.

On September 3, “the Court of Appeal in Sevastopol upheld the court's decision to evict the Crimean Diocese of the OCU from the Cathedral of the Holy and Equal-to-the-Apostles Volodymyr and Olha. For several years, human rights advocates have been recording the facts of systematic violation of freedom of religion by the Russian authorities of the occupied Crimea. The head of the Crimean human rights group Olha Skrypnyk noted that during the occupation of Crimea, almost all religious communities and organizations suffered harassment, restrictions, persecution, except the Church of the Moscow Patriarchate.