Metropolitan Luke: Events around UOC has signs of genocide

Metropolitan Luke. Photo: Zaporizhzhia Eparchy

Metropolitan Luke of Zaporizhzhia stated in an interview with Oleksandr Shelest that the pressure on the Ukrainian Orthodox Church falls under the signs of genocide enshrined in the 1948 UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.

"Recently I came across the definition of genocide. And there the definition of genocide is the destruction on national, ethnic or religious grounds. And so if one looks – are we not now witnessing genocide?" said the hierarch, commenting on the murder of a monk at the Holy Dormition Sviatohirsk Lavra.

He recalled that the Convention defines five forms of such actions, and the first of them is the killing of members of the group.

"Why are we being killed? We can recall the year 2015. God's servant Anatoliy was beaten in Sumy, in the Transfiguration Cathedral, at night. We can recall the assassination attempt in Vinnytsia on a priest – thank God, help arrived in time, but the priest was slashed across the neck with a knife,” the Metropolitan said.

The hierarch also mentioned the situation in Cherkasy, where a man with a gun threatened Metropolitan Theodosiy.

"Yes, this is still an isolated case, one cannot yet speak of open genocide, but are these not the preconditions for genocide?" the bishop noted.

The archbishop identified the second criterion as the infliction of serious bodily or mental harm, pointing to what happens during church seizures.

"I remember: Bishop Nikita was standing outside when they approached him, shouted, 'Moscow priest!' and beat him. What is that? This is the result of impunity and of an already established – not emerging, but established – goal of destroying the Ukrainian Orthodox Church,” he said.

Metropolitan Luke identified the third sign as the deliberate creation of living conditions intended to bring about the physical destruction of the group.

"People are already being fired simply for being parishioners of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. Again, Cherkasy is an example of this. People are bullied for being parishioners of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. In Lviv, people are being harassed, with people following them to their apartments. What is this? How should it be defined?" the hierarch said.

The two remaining criteria – measures intended to prevent births and the forcible transfer of children – the hierarch did not yet apply to Ukrainian realities but posed the question: "What kind of childbearing is possible under such conditions?"

"This Convention defined five criteria of genocide, but three of them we already see," Metropolitan Luka concluded.

Earlier, the UOJ reported that the Polish Church called the murder of the Sviatohirsk Lavra monk a tragedy.

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