Ukrainian police has begun investigating an OCU representative’s threats to a priest of the canonical Church

On September 26, 2020, the Pechera administration of the National Police Directorate in Kiev opened a criminal case and launched investigation into the threats coming from ‘OCU priest’ Petr Sokolovsky to a cleric of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church.

In the Facebook correspondence between Archpriest Pavel Belyi, dean of the St. Andrew Church in Kiev, and Petr Sokolovsky, rector of an ‘OCU’ church in the Kolomyia district, Ivano-Frankovsk Region, the representative of the schismatic structure resorted to threats. Father Pavel published screens of these messages on his page in Facebook on September 13.

‘Listen, Pavel Belyi, do not come out too much in our land or else you will become not quite white in the black Ukrainian humus, Petr Sokolovsky wrote. In his response, Archpriest Pavel noted that it is the Lord Who presides over everything, and as He will grant so it will be. Then the ‘OCU cleric’ made another threat, ‘We are drawing a bead on you, be ready to become humus. We have taken you up’.

On September 25, Father Pavel Belyi gave an appropriate written statement to law-enforcement bodies, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church’s Synodal Legal Department reported. The following day, law-enforcers opened a criminal case under Article 129, Part 1 of the Ukrainian Criminal Code – a threat to kill. According to this article, an offender can expect an arrest for a period up to six months or a custodial restrain up to two years.

Information-Education Department

Ukrainian Orthodox Church

DECR Communication Service