Discrimination and deportation
Lvov, 14 December 2011
President of Ukraine
Viktor Yanukovych
Dear Mr President,
we, Secretaries of the Byzantine Catholic Patriarchate, hereby appeal to You to stop religious discrimination which is aimed at elimination of the Ukrainian orthodox Greek-Catholic Church (UOGCC). There is a plot devised by the UGCC leadership to deport our Patriarch Elijah from Ukraine. This deportation has been planned by the UGCC for at least six months. It is apparent lawlessness and political corruption on the part of the UGCC leadership which uses state structures for its purposes. The UGCC leadership has disclosed its discriminatory, deportation and elimination purposes several times in the mass media.
This all was preceded by a series of discriminatory actions against the orthodox Catholics on the orders of the UGCC: efforts at dissolution of the monastery of the orthodox sisters and violent abduction of a postulant executed by the police at the command of Mr Derzhko from Lvov Regional State Administration; August frame-up trial against the Patriarch; pressures exerted by Lvov Regional State Administration with the purpose of putting a stop to Divine Liturgies in Pidhirtsi; efforts at prohibition of Divine Liturgies in the chapel of the orthodox Catholic sisters in Lvov through unlawful proceedings at the request of Mayor of Lvov…
The culmination of discrimination against the orthodox Catholic believers is now an effort to deport the Patriarch on the orders of the UGCC as well. The instrument for achieving this purpose is Mr Lohin and Mr Salo, leading officials of Visa Department in Lvov. They refused to grant Patriarch Elijah legal visa extension. They themselves broke the law with impunity and put an innocent person in a position of an offender. The Patriarch resolved to remain with his flock even at the cost of deportation or an international scandal.
Mr President, we demand that this case concerning a criminal attempt at illegal deportation of the Patriarch should be dealt with as a matter of priority at the Ukraine-EU Summit in Kiev on 19 December 2011. It is connected with purposeful long-term discrimination against a religious minority, specifically with systematic incitement of religious enmity by the UGCC hierarchy. This is violation of the Ukrainian laws and international charters, concerning fundamental rights to freedom of conscience and freedom of religion.
We demand that the Summit should impose sanctions on the perpetrators of this religious discrimination, namely Mr Lohin and Mr Salo.
+ Methodius OSBMr + Timothy OSBMr
Secretary Bishops of the Byzantine Catholic Patriarchate
Copies to:
– Minister of Interior of Ukraine
– Members of the Ukrainian Parliament
– Head of the State Security Service
– President of the Czech Republic
– Presidents of Russia and Belarus
– Mr Thomas Hammarberg, Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights
– Mr Stefan F?le, Commissioner of the EU for Enlargement and European Neighbourhood Policy
– Participants in the Ukraine-EU Summit in Kiev, 19 December 2011
– Mass media of Ukraine and abroad
