The issue of protecting Orthodox believers in Ukraine has been raised across the Russian media for years. Plenty of fake stories has been designed to this end.
The Russian occupiers may now try to revisit this topic to claim protecting the followers of the Moscow Patriarchate justifies their invasion of Ukraine, ye.ua reports.
After the Orthodox Church of Ukraine received the tomos of autocephaly in 2019, Russian media reported that Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that “US authorities are primarily responsible for establishing the non-canonical Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU).”
Back in 2018, the head of the UOC-KP, Patriarch Filaret, said that Russia could use “protection of Orthodox believers in Ukraine” as a pretext for war.
In the following years, the Russian media regularly reported on the “seizure” of churches in Ukraine. During his speech on February 22, 2022, Vladimir Putin used the “Kyiv persecutes parishioners and believers of the UOC-MP” thesis as an excuse to recognize the “independence of the People’s Republic of Luhansk and Donetsk.”
Last week, the Russian media claimed there had been mass complaints from Ukraine about the seizure of UOC-MP churches by groups of armed men. According to propaganda reports, at least 27 church sites were attacked. The topic of protecting the faithful may be the next one to be actively promoted by Russian propaganda masterminds to justify the invasion of Ukraine.
Meanwhile, it’s the Russian occupiers who are shelling temples and monasteries run by the UOC-MP. In particular, in Donetsk region, they shelled the Svyatohirsk Lavra, and in Kharkiv – the city’s oldest church, the Assumption Cathedral.
