Kremlin spokesman describes demand that Ukrainian Orthodox Church's monks leave Kiev Pecherskaya Lavra outrageous, Patriarch Kirill urges Pope, UN, CoE to prevent its closure
MOSCOW. March 13 (Interfax) - Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has described the Ukrainian authorities' demand that monks of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church leave the Kiev Pecherskaya Lavra as outrageous and inadmissible and called for an international reaction to that.
"This is an absolutely unprecedented attitude to representatives of the church, the Russian Orthodox Church. We believe that's inadmissible and, of course, think that the international community should give a proper response to the outrageous decision of the kind," Peskov told reporters on Monday.
The Kremlin is concerned about the Lavra situation, Peskov said.
In turn, Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia wrote to international religious and political leaders, calling on them to prevent Ukrainian authorities from ousting the Ukrainian Orthodox Church monks from the Kievo-Pecherskaya Lavra monastery.
The letters were sent out on Saturday to Eastern Orthodox Church leaders, Pope Francis, Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Antonio Guterres, the UN Secretary-General, Helga Maria Schmid, Secretary General of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, Marija Pejcinovic Buric, Secretary General of the Council of Europe, and other religious and political leaders.
Earlier, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church said there are no legal or moral grounds for its eviction from the Kievo-Pecherskaya Lavra and therefore it is not going to leave the monastery.
"The Ukrainian Orthodox Church cannot leave the monastery as there are no legal grounds for that," Metropolitan Kliment, the head of the information and education department of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, said in an interview with the media outlet Strana.
"The administration of the reserve sent an ultimatum in which it announced, without any comments, severance of the lease contract and demanded eviction from the monastery. Such demands have nothing to do with the Ukrainian legislation," Metropolitan Kliment said.
Moreover, it is unclear on what grounds the Ukrainian Orthodox Church should give up the physical assets and the cultural heritage that was revived and was preserved by the monks, he said. "On what grounds should that be given to people who have no relation to it? They didn't create it, they didn't refurbish it, they only destroyed for all past years, and they now want to take it away from us," Metropolitan Kliment said.
The Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate on Friday received a warning from the directorate of the Kievo-Pecherskaya Lavra national preserve, regarding the termination of a July 19, 2013 agreement on free use by it of the worship structures and other state property located on the grounds of the monastery.
In a letter published on the Lavra's website, its acting director Alexander Rudnik invokes a Ukrainian presidential decree of December 1, 2022, entitled "On certain aspects of the operation of religious organizations in Ukraine and the imposition of personal special economic and other restrictive measures (sanctions)."
On December 23 the Ukrainian government set up an inter-agency working group to draft proposals and recommendations on how to organize the execution of certain tasks relating to the operation of religious organizations in Ukraine. The group concluded that the Ukrainian Orthodox Church had violated the aforesaid agreement.
"Considering the conclusions of the Inter-agency working group, and the Ukrainian Ministry of Culture and Information Policy letter No. 06/34/2234-23 of March 09, 2023, pursuant to Clause 8.1. of the Agreement, the Preserve is hereby warning about terminating the Agreement from March 29, 2023," the warning says.
Once the Ukrainian Orthodox Church representatives have left the Lavra, a commission will begin working there on the transfer of the state property.