An open letter to the President of Ukraine (11.8.2011)
Lvov, 11th August 2011
President of Ukraine
V. Yanukovych
Dear Mr President,
the laws relating to religious discrimination and fomentation of religious hatred are being violated in Ukraine. These crimes are committed by the state authorities, namely by the Regional State Administration in Lvov (R. Kurash) and Regional State Administration in Ternopol (I. Kulchytskyi). The police in Lvov and Chortkiv (Ternopol region) cooperates with them in these crimes.
On 30th July 2009, the police of Lvov, in the presence of Mr Kurash, committed a violent crime of abduction of a postulant from the monastery of the sisters of the Ukrainian orthodox Greek-Catholic Church (UOGCC). In Chortkiv, the religious sisters of the UOGCC were physically attacked and injured when going to the Divine Liturgy. The police present allowed the sisters to be treated with lynch violence. There was a serious risk of fatal injury. A certain sister has a tumour on the liver. She was knocked to the ground and the attackers repeatedly kicked her. If the blows had hit the tumour, it could have caused death. Another sister was not long after a surgery and the attackers kicked her too. The police punished none of the aggressors but rather protected them.
The same happened on 19th July 2011 in Lvov. People manipulated by defamations spread by the UGCC hierarchy forcibly removed a cross from the roof of our church and threw it down. They thus committed a crime of desecration of a religious symbol. When the religious sisters arrived at the scene of the crime along with the Patriarch of the Byzantine Catholic Patriarchate, the police – on the orders of the UGCC Lvov archbishopric – did not protect Patriarch Elijah against aggressors but rather protected the aggressors, arrested the Patriarch and took him to the police station. The police detained him for 14 hours. Then he was taken to court for alleged injuries caused to an attacker whom he had pushed away when defending a religious sister against an attack. The action had been planned by the UGCC archbishopric of Lvov. The instrument they used was the Lvov police with the knowledge of Lvov Regional State Administration (Mr Kurash). The police are also seeking to carry out Husar’s plan of deportation of Patriarch Elijah from Ukraine. In addition, on the orders of the UGCC hierarchy again, the mass media in Ukraine systematically denigrate our orthodox Catholic Church and call it a sect, which is a gross insult.
Dear Mr President, the laws of Ukraine have been violated already for two years, since the UGCC hierarchy has illegally prevented lawful registration of the UOGCC. We ask: Are the Ukrainian laws in force or have the state authorities become instruments of the Greek-Catholic Church headed by Husar who has put pressure on them for two years so as to prevent registration of the UOGCC? The UGCC hierarchy hypocritically exploits the State Committee on Matters of Nationalities and Religions headed by Y. Bohutskyi who consequently acts contrary to the law of Ukraine by preventing registration of the UOGCC.
Dear Mr President, we believe that You personally will intervene in this matter so that the laws of Ukraine be observed, the culprits punished and religious freedom in Ukraine respected.
On behalf of the UOGCC
Markian Hitiuk OSBMr
secretary bishop
Cc:
– U.S. Senator R. Wicker
– MEP N. Farage
– Members of the Ukrainian Parliament
– Representatives of the Orthodox Churches in Ukraine
