Khmelnytskyi authorities take away a land plot from UOC community

The Khmelnytskyi City Council decided to confiscate the land plot from the religious community of the UOC of the Holy Martyrs Faith, Hope, Love and their mother Sophia. This is stated in the decision of the City Council of August 26, 2022.

As indicated in the document, the authorities justify their step by the decision adopted at the extraordinary session of the Khmelnytskyi City Council on June 17, 2022. It goes about an appeal to the National Security and Defence Council and the Verkhovna Rada, in which deputies demand to expedite the consideration of a bill to ban the activities of the UOC in the country.

The two-hectare plot claimed by the city authorities is located at 16/1 A, Panas Myrnyi Street (Ozerna microdistrict). In 2012, the Khmelnytskyi City Council allocated the land to the UOC for the construction of a temple, spiritual and educational buildings, a parish house, outbuildings and park development. Now there are construction works going on. The believers built a temporary chapel of the Martyrs Adrian and Natalia.

At the beginning of summer, the city authorities already demanded that the UOC parishioners either go to the OCU or demolish the chapel. According to the rector of the community of the Holy Martyrs Faith, Hope, Love and their mother Sophia, Archpriest Alexander Kostenko, the city authorities put pressure on him personally and on the parishioners. They were told that in Khmelnytskyi all the churches, according to the documents, had already been “transferred” to the OCU and would gradually be seized. “We planned to build a large temple, but now there is such a situation that we do not know how to save our chapel,” said the priest.

Back in 2018, the UOC community won the court, which ordered the Department of Architecture and Urban Planning of the Khmelnytskyi City Council to consider the appeal of the parish to start construction of the temple. In June 2022, Khmelnytskyi mayor Oleksandr Simchyshyn proposed to ban the UOC, to take away the land from the Church and transfer it to “Ukrainian churches”. The head of the Khmelnytskyi District Council Oleksandr Chernievych boasted that in a month he personally transferred 16 churches of the UOC to the OCU, and the head of the Khmelnytskyi RMA Serhiy Gamaliy received an order from Dumenko for supporting the OCU.

As reported, law enforcement agencies have taken over the heads of administrations that oppress the UOC.

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