Amsterdam: Ukrainian government terminated UOC's right to use Kyiv Lavra
The attorney pointed to the UOC’s independence despite accusations from government officials.
The Ukrainian government has deprived the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the right to pray at the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra. International human rights lawyer Robert Amsterdam described the decision as an open disregard for canonical Orthodoxy.
“The Ukrainian government has literally terminated the right of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) to use the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra,” Robert Amsterdam said, “as it has done for almost a thousand years.”
The attorney stressed that government officials accuse the UOC of ties to Russia despite what he described as the actual facts. According to Amsterdam, the Kyiv authorities are persecuting the UOC even though the Church openly opposed the military invasion and declared its independence from Moscow.
Amsterdam’s statement came in response to a post on X by Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha. The foreign minister congratulated Ukrainians on the 975th anniversary of the monastery’s founding, calling the ancient monastery a symbol of enduring statehood.
Sybiha also announced a new tradition of ringing the Lavra bells together. In his view, the initiative links the shrine’s centuries-old history with Ukraine’s modern movement toward the European community.
Earlier, the UOJ reported that Amsterdam said the authorities in Ukraine and Armenia were destroying the Church using Bolshevik methods.
