Four cases against UOC being heard in Ternopil region courts

The Holy Dormition Pochaiv Lavra. Photo: photo.i.ua

The Ternopil Regional Prosecutor's Office announced that four lawsuits concerning religious organizations of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church are being heard in courts in Ternopil and Kyiv, reports the head of the Ternopil Regional Prosecutor's Office, Vitaliy Panchenko, in a comment to "Ukrinform".

Vitaliy Panchenko stated that the court proceedings concern the return of property to state ownership and the seizure of land plots. Three lawsuits were initiated by the Prosecutor's Office, while in the fourth case, prosecutors joined the proceedings on the side of the Ternopil Regional Military Administration.

"Four cases concerning religious organizations of the UOC in Ternopil region are before the courts," said Vitaliy Panchenko. "They concern two matters specifically: the return of property to state ownership, and the recovery of land plots from unlawful possession."

Under the first lawsuit, the Prosecutor's Office seeks to strip the Holy Dormition Pochaiv Lavra of the right to use a land plot of 12.3912 hectares on which the monastery complex is located. The office demands that the decision of the Pochaiv City Council be declared invalid and that the state registration of the communal property right and the right of use by the UOC community be annulled.

The second proceeding is based on a lawsuit by the Ternopil Regional Military Administration with the participation of the Prosecutor's Office, demanding that the religious structures of the 18th-century Pochaiv Holy Spirit Skete be transferred from the Pochaiv Lavra's possession to the state.

Two more lawsuits aim to annul the decisions of the state registrar regarding the registration of ownership rights to UOC religious communities and to transfer to the state two architectural monuments of national significance: the All Saints Church of 1773 in the cemetery of the city of Pochaiv, and the Intercession Church with a bell tower in the village of Stary Pochaiv in the Kremenets district.

Earlier, the UOJ reported that DESS gave the Pochaiv Lavra another 60 days to break ties with the Kyiv Metropolis of the UOC.

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