The UOC MP is not an independent religious organization, but a continuation of the Russian state and an instrument in the Russian hybrid war. The UOC MP is a Kremlin-controlled body of the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine. The UOC MP provided material support to Russia’s initial invasion of Crimea and the eastern regions of Ukraine in 2014.
This is reported by the Institute for the Study of War.
Russian soldiers used UOC MP temples as military depots, garrisons, field hospitals and even combat positions during Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. One UOC-MP priest in Lysychansk, Luhansk region, had been gathering information about the OCU clergy and asked Russian soldiers to kill a Ukrainian priest.
It is reported that the Russian forces did everything possible to hold accountable certain priests of the UOC MP in Ukraine who did not fully cooperate with the Russian forces.
According to reports, Russian troops raided the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral of the UOC MP in Melitopol in February 2023 in order to register UOC MP priests who refused to pray for the success of the Russian military in Ukraine or for the health of the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Kirill. According to reports, Russian soldiers abducted a priest of the UOC MP who was actively distributing humanitarian aid to the Ukrainian civilian population in Kherson in April 2022.
“Russia will continue to weaponize the UOC MP and religion to incite social tensions in Ukraine and influence battlefield realities,” say analysts.
The Kremlin may call for a ceasefire on Orthodox Easter on April 16, as it did on Orthodox Christmas in January 2023. The Kremlin selectively called for a ceasefire on religious holidays to influence the situation at the front. For example, the Kremlin refused to cease fire for the Orthodox Easter of 2022 “in order not give the Kyiv nationalists a break” during the battle for Mariupol.
The Kremlin may call for an Easter truce, as such a pause would disproportionately benefit Russian forces and allow them to consolidate their gains in Bakhmut and prepare defenses against a Ukrainian counteroffensive in the spring of 2023.
Supporters of international religious freedom should back Ukraine’s efforts to liberate its territories, the Institute for the Study of War says.
Religious freedom in Ukraine – especially the freedom of religious minorities – is much better protected in the territories controlled by Ukraine than in Russia or in the Ukrainian lands occupied by the Kremlin. The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) has identified Russia as one of the major violators of religious freedom due to its restrictive state policies and persecution of peaceful religious activity.
