DESS: Registration of UOC monastery clones facilitates their transfer to OCU

Andriy Smirnov. Photo: Screenshot from VICHE video

Andriy Smirnov, an external expert of the State Service of Ukraine for Ethnopolitics and Freedom of Conscience (DESS), stated that parallel legal monasteries of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) are being registered in order to make it easier for the state to transfer them to the ownership of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU). He shared this in an interview on the VICHE YouTube channel on May 7, 2025.

Smirnov, who is also a member of the OCU Synodal Commission, cited the example of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, pointing out that the creation of a "clone" monastery simplified the transfer of the Dormition Cathedral to the OCU.

“Why are parallel legal entities being created? I think the answer is obvious. It is done so that if the state decides to transfer these monastic complexes to the OCU, it would be ready to take them into possession. This is what happened with the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra. If a legal entity had not been created, then even temporary use, lease, or transfer of the Dormition Cathedral would have been more complicated,” he stated.

As the UOJ previously reported, a court hearing is scheduled in Chernihiv concerning the eviction of nuns from the UOC's Yelets Convent.

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