State Ethnic Policy confirms impossibility of reserving UOC priests from mobilization

The State Service for Ethnic Policy and Freedom of Conscience of Ukraine has approved a procedure for granting deferred mobilization to representatives of religious organizations in the country. The published information confirms the earlier assumptions that the clergy of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church will not be among the religious figures exempt from military service. This was reported by Interfax-Ukraine.

It is established that this order applies to clergymen: who are the heads of religious organizations and whose information is contained in the Unified State Register of Legal Entities, Individual Entrepreneurs and Public Organizations; who work in religious organizations under an employment contract in the amount necessary to ensure the proper functioning of religious organizations.

At the same time, a religious organization is recognized as critical for the functioning of the economy and ensuring the livelihoods of the population during a special period if it simultaneously meets the following criteria: the Unified State Register contains information on the identification code of the legal entity; the record of state registration of the establishment of a legal entity is entered in the Unified State Register of Legal Entities no later than December 26, 2024; the religious organization is not included in the list of religious organizations in Ukraine affiliated with a foreign religious organization that is not a member of the

As we reported earlier, the recent decree of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine on the inclusion of religious organizations in the list of critical infrastructure and, as a result, the reservation of clergy from military service in the Armed Forces of Ukraine, may become a trap for the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. This opinion was expressed by Ukrainian MP Oleksandr Dubinsky, who believes that the state, using the norms of such a Cabinet order, will blackmail the priests of the UOC, persuading them to join the OCU in exchange for exemption from military service.