Poroshenko: I don't know such a Church – UOC
The ex-president of Ukraine insists on negotiations between the UOC and the OCU.
The fifth president of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, has put forward several conditions for the UOC. In an interview with Channel 5, he stated that he does not know such a Church.
“I don’t know such a church – the UOC. I know that according to the current legislation there is a Ukrainian branch of the Russian Orthodox Church. What is the future of the Russian Orthodox Church? Terrible. Because it's not a church. This is a KGB den that approves and blesses the murder of Ukrainians, poison for any believer,” Poroshenko argues.
He stated that he has several tests for the UOC supposed to demonstrate that it had separated from the ROC.
“If you have separated, inform the Orthodox world about it. Send to all 15 Orthodox churches that you have nothing more to do with Kirill and the Moscow Church. But whom do you have to do with then?" Poroshenko wonders.
“And then start negotiations on a single, conciliar Orthodox Church of Ukraine. Get into it. I'm sure the door is open. And if someone prevents you from doing this – collaborators, separatists, spies, those who kept weapons or propagandist Russian literature of the ‘Russian world’ in their churches, money that they received from the Kremlin, and everything else – get rid of such people. And this is what the SBU should be doing now – to identify them and bring to justice, because they work for the aggressor, commit a criminal offense and betray the state,” explains the Eurosolidarity leader.
As reported by the UOJ, the European Solidarity party demands to immediately adopt a law banning the activities of the ROC and its subordinate organizations in Ukraine.