RUSSIA RELIGION NEWS


Contrast between Ukrainian and Moscow point of view on current situation

UPTsMP THINKS A CIVIL WAR IS GOING ON IN EAST UKRAINE AND CRIMEA IS PART OF ANOTHER STATE

RISU, 27 October 2015

 

In his interview with the weekly Argumenty i Fakty of 21 October 2015, the vice-chairman of the Department for External Church Relations [OVTsS] of UPTsMP, Archpriest Nikolai Danilevich, once again expressed the position of that confession with respect to the conflict in the east of Ukraine. He said that what is happening in the ATO [Anti-Terrorist Operation] zone is "an internal conflict," and therefore the UPTsMP cannot support the military actions being conducted by the Ukrainian state. The UPTsMP thinks that it is necessary to achieve peace. However under what conditions this peace is supposed to be achieved, the representative of the OVTsS did not specify.

 

We recall that a mass of documentary facts and evidence from various sources, including foreign ones, as well has satellite intelligence, have told of support by the government of Russia for representatives of the DPR and LPR, which are considered in Ukraine to be terrorist groupings. Representatives of many states of the world have spoken about Russia's direct aggression against the Ukrainian state. Ukrainian troops have frequently arrested on Ukrainian territory personnel of Russian forces and have also displayed types of military equipment which are not in the arsenal of Ukrainian military forces but are in the arsenal of the Russian army. Yet earlier, President Putin, in the film "Crimea. Path to the Motherland" acknowledged that regular troops of the Russian army participated in the annexation of the Crimean peninsula.

 

Speaking about the position of the church in Crimea, Archpriest Nikolai Danilevich called the structure that is located on the peninsula a "foreign diocese," which is evidence of the recognition on the part of the UPTsMP of Crimea as territory of another state, not an occupied part of Ukraine. At the same time, the representative of OVTsS recalled that the synod of the UPTsMP supports "the territorial integrity and independence of Ukraine."

 

The representative of the UPTsMP also recalled the position of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church relative to the armed conflict in the east of Ukraine. Repeating the words of the head of the OVTsS, Metropolitan Antony, Archpriest Nikolai Danilevich again declared that UGKTs had changed its position from words about "war" to words about "peace." Yesterday, the Department of External Church Relation of the Moscow patriarchate, headed by Metropolitan of Volokolamsk Ilarion, also spoke out with similar accusations against the UGKTs.

 

We recall that earlier, in his interview with the Catholic news agency Kathpress, His Beatitude Sviatoslav responded to the accusations of Metropolitan Antony. The head of the Greek Catholic Church said:  "UGKTs has never called for violence and war, as our opponents accuse us of. We have consistently condemned aggressors and those who supply weapons to illegal armed formations, and along with all members of the All-Ukrainian Council of Churches and Religious Organizations we have called them to lay down their arms. We affirm the right and duty of Ukrainians to defend their land from foreign invaders, in accordance with the social doctrine of the Catholic Church, we provide chaplain care to Ukrainian troops as defenders of a just peace, and we educate Ukrainian society in the principles of Christian patriotism not with hatred toward aliens but with Christian love for one's own people, land, and state. We consider a just peace to be the victory of Ukraine, which cannot be achieved on the conditions of the aggressor. We consistently call for reconciliation, but we cannot allow reconciliation with war, violence, injustice, and the denial of the right to the existence of the people of Ukraine and their state." (tr. by PDS, posted 27 October 2015)


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