Amsterdam urges organizers to exclude Yelensky from IRF participation

Viktor Yelenskyi. Photo: "Suspilne" screenshot

Lawyer of the UOC Robert Amsterdam wrote an open letter to American human rights advocate Katrina Swett and former U.S. Ambassador for International Religious Freedom Sam Brownback regarding the participation of the head of the DESS Viktor Yelensky in the International Religious Freedom Summit. The letter was published on his X page.

Amsterdam pointed out that "before Mr. Yelenskyi's tenure as the Head of State Service of Ukraine for Ethnic Affairs, the UOC was guaranteed the right to practice their faith free from harm and harassment," but with his arrival, "all this changed."

"Mr. Yelemskyi capitalized on the fog of war to scapegoat the UOC as a Russian entity, despite having no evidence. He abused his station to run a campaign of predation against the UOC with the ultimate goal of eradicating the Church and usurping its assets. The has culminated in a proposed bill that is before the Verkhovna Rada that purports to illegalize and outlaw the UOC," Amsterdam wrote.

He told the recipients that IRF "carries the hopes and dreams of all oppressed religious minorities", hence the participation of individuals like Yelensky there is unacceptable.

"Do not allow this important conference to whitewash the repressive behavior of those who falsely imprison priests and other men and women of faith and hold religious beliefs hostage to political expediency," the UOC lawyer urged.

Finally, he asked to consider this dire position, adding, "We also ask that you reconsider the attendance of Mr. Yelenskyi or, if he is to remain in attendance, to ask him to explain the actions he has taken to unlawfully deny the practice of faith of millions of his Ukrainian compatriots," wrote the human rights defender on behalf of the Amsterdam and Partners LLP law firm.

Earlier, the the UOJ reported that a criminal case was opened against the leadership of the State Ethnopolitics Service of Ukraine.

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