Yelensky and OP representative travel to US to justify the law banning UOC

Kovalska and Yelensky with the USCIRF leadership. Photo: dess.gov.ua

Head of the State Service of Ukraine for Ethnopolitics and Freedom of Conscience, Viktor Yelensky, and Deputy Head of the Office of the President of Ukraine, Olena Kovalska, held a series of meetings in the United States focused on current issues of religious freedom. According to the DESS website, they discussed "legislative initiatives to protect the constitutional order in the activities of religious organizations", presumably referring to the recent controversial "law banning the UOC".

During the visit, meetings were held with the leadership of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), senior policy advisor to the Helsinki Commission Paul Massaro, representatives of the U.S. State Department, World Baptist Alliance President Elijah Brown, the leadership of the Museum of the Bible, Eric Patterson, president and CEO of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, and leaders of the Ukrainian community in the U.S.

"The participants discussed key issues of religious freedom in Ukraine. The discussions focused on legislative initiatives to protect the constitutional order in the activities of religious organizations in the context of countering external threats and ensuring internal stability; they also exchanged views on the active participation of religious communities in public life and in the defense of the country," the statement said.

As previously reported by UOJ, Yelensky promised not to rely on documents from the Russian Orthodox Church concerning the UOC.

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