Local authorities in Sumy banned Orthodox believers to hold a traditional religious procession
March 20, 2015. The extraordinary meeting of the executive committee of the city of Sumy (Ukraine) prohibited the traditional cross procession of believers of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (UOC-MP) as reports Topgorod.
The community of St.Sergius made a request for a permission to organize religious activities on the feast of the venerated icon Mother of God Feodorovskaya – on the 27 of March. On this day, from 8:00 to 17:00, the community planned a religious procession in which the faithful would go around the perimeter of Sumy to protect the city. This event passed in the last years with the participation of the clergy and did not lead to any disorders in the city.
A member of the executive committee Maxim Galitsky (representative of the movement “Freedom”) appealed to his colleagues to ban the religious procession taking into consideration the tense socio-political situation in the country. According to him there can be a provocation in Sumy during the procession. Some activists supported him, thinking the procession to be a political event – “pro-Russian action.” The movement “Freedom” reminded that the icon is related to the Russian empire and it is regarded as one of the shrines of the Romanov’s House. There were disputes among the members of the executive committee. As a result, none of its members voted “in favor” of this decision, and the procession was banned.
Judicial comment of the Centre of the Monitoring the rights and freedom of Orthodox Christians in Europe
http://hudoc.echr.coe.int/
The European Court on human rights (Application no. 20372/11) made the judgment on the case of Vyerentsov v. Ukraine on the the 11 April 2013. The case concerns the legislation defining in Ukraine peaceful demonstrations. Than the Court announced the violations by Ukraine of the Article 11 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. The court criticized the country for the existing order of permissions for peaceful demonstrations when according to democratic standards this order must be notifying.
In particular, in the point 55 the Court “observes that, admittedly, the Resolution of the Ukrainian Parliament on temporary application of certain legislative acts of the Soviet Union refers to temporary application of Soviet legislation and no law has yet been enacted by the Ukrainian Parliament regulating the procedure for holding peaceful demonstrations, although Articles 39 and 92 of the Constitution clearly require that such a procedure be established by law, that is, by an Act of the Ukrainian Parliament. Whilst the Court accepts that it may take some time for a country to establish its legislative framework during a transitional period, it cannot agree that a delay of more than twenty years is justifiable, especially when such a fundamental right as freedom of peaceful assembly is at stake. The Court thus concludes that the interference with the applicant’s right to freedom of peaceful assembly was not prescribed by law”.