Ukraine should ban the UOC and recognize the ROC as a terrorist organization, - political scientist

Political expert and head of the Real Politics analytical group, Oleksandr Antoniuk, believes that the state should completely ban the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and recognize the Russian Orthodox Church as a terrorist organization. In addition, Antoniuk opposes allowing UOC priests to join the OCU, as they are all “Kremlin agents.” He spoke about this on the Espreso TV channel.

«I think that we need to recognize, first and foremost, the Russian Orthodox Church as a terrorist organization at the state and interfaith levels, which, together with the terrorist military-criminal regime, is committing genocide against the Ukrainian people, as well as other enslaved peoples living in the Russian Federation. […] We must give our counterintelligence, our special services, in particular the SBU, sufficient tools to completely localize this entire organization. Anyone who was associated with the Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate, there may be different people there, but still, I believe that among the leadership, they are accomplices to terrorism, no matter how they position themselves,» — the political scientist noted.

At the same time, Antoniuk is convinced that after the ban on the UOC, priests of the Church cannot be accepted into the OCU. Because of this, he claims, the “Ukrainian church” will receive “Russian agents” within its structure.

«Can you imagine what kind of agents we might end up with in a church that is essentially Ukrainian and has no direct contact with Moscow? I am surprised that during this entire period, in the 11th year of the war, we have to talk about obvious basic things. Especially since we must clearly understand that the Russian school of special services is one of the most effective in the world. Therefore, I believe that there should be appropriate, fairly strict measures,» — he added.

Earlier, we reported that despite pressure and a de facto ban by the Ukrainian government, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church remains the largest religious organization in Ukraine in terms of the number of religious communities and followers. Even in Kyiv, the number of UOC churches is twice as high as that of the OCU.