Ukraine - August 2024

The Verkhovna Rada (Parliament) passed a bill on 20 August banning religious entities with connections to Russia from operating in Ukraine. The long-anticipated law primarily targets the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (OUCMP), a self-governing church which is under the authority of the Patriarchate of Moscow. OUCMP priests and bishops have been accused of directly collaborating or providing moral and public support for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The OUCMP asserts the law is an unconstitutional overreach, and stresses that it separated administratively from the Moscow Patriarchate at the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion. Ukrainian officials dispute the OUCMP’s characterization of a break with Moscow. The law gives individual OUCMP parishes nine months to integrate with the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU) or face dissolution. Many parishes are reportedly planning legal opposition to the new law and the OUCMP maintains significant international support. Seventy-two per cent of Ukrainians are Orthodox Christians.

Sources: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Kyiv Independent, Kyiv International Institute of Sociology, Public Orthodoxy