Lawyer: Depriving a person who was born and lives in Ukraine of citizenship is nonsense

Lawyer and attorney Andriy Domansky, who defends the hierarchs of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church—Metropolitans Arseniy (Yakovenko) and Pavlo (Lebed)—in court, commented on the situation with the deprivation of citizenship of the Primate of the UOC, Metropolitan Onufriy of Kyiv and All Ukraine. The lawyer called the situation “nonsense” when a person who was born and lives in Ukraine is unjustifiably deprived of citizenship. He spoke about this in a comment to the publication Glavkom.

“Article 25 of the Constitution stipulates that a citizen of Ukraine cannot be deprived of citizenship and the right to change citizenship. In the case of the termination of citizenship with regard to Metropolitan Onufriy, a dilemma has arisen. After all, he did not receive citizenship by decree of the head of state, as is the case, for example, with foreign citizens—the primate is a citizen of Ukraine by birth and place of residence. This is nonsense!” – Domansky noted.

The human rights activist added that the option of deporting Metropolitan Onufriy is unlikely to be feasible, since such decisions must be made in court, and the defense of the Primate of the UOC is already preparing lawsuits against the state to challenge Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s decision.

“I don’t think it will come to the deportation of Metropolitan Onufriy. After all, the clergyman intends to prove his case in court. Therefore, it would be illogical for the authorities to take premature measures without a final court decision,” – the lawyer concluded.

Earlier, Verkhovna Rada deputy Artem Dmitruk stated that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky personally coordinates actions aimed at ousting the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church on a daily basis.