Metropolitan Clement comments on arrest of Lavra abbot

Metropolitan Clement. Photo: news.church.ua

Chairman of the UOC Information and Educational Department Metropolitan Clement commented on the arrest of the abbot of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, Metropolitan Pavel of Vyshgorod and Chornobyl, reports the UOC Information Centre.

On 14 July 2023, the Solomyansky District Court of Kyiv satisfied the petition of prosecutors to change the measure of restraint to the abbot of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra Metropolitan Pavel of Vyshgorod and Chornobyl from round-the-clock house arrest to detention. The judge agreed on the amount of bail as an alternative to detention in the amount of 33 million hryvnias.

"Undoubtedly, I would not like to resort to assessing the validity of the charges against the Lavra abbot. This all, I am convinced, will be expertly done by lawyers. However, the detention of the bishop on suspicion, which concerns his statement in a private conversation on the phone, the blatant disregard by the court of a number of circumstances proving the absence of a threat to the society of this man and without such extreme measures and a number of other circumstances cannot hide the presence of certain motivations of the judge, which have nothing in common with the fundamental principle of the rule of law. Especially when such decisions are taken against the background of other high-profile court rulings against corrupt officials and MPs, who are granted not arrests and not millions of dollars, but paltry bail amounts compared to the sums they embezzled, which are described by the media," Metropolitan Clement said.

"It is a shame that this scandal has already become the subject of discussion of the situation with fundamental rights and freedoms in Ukraine abroad. After all, the broadcast of the course of the trial of Metropolitan Pavel clearly showed that almost the only aggravating circumstance that was worth putting the bishop in prison for the first time in the modern history of the democratic world was his affiliation with the UOC, which today is equal to the status of a second-class person," he added.

As reported, the Lavra abbot said that he was tried for the Church and faith.

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