OSCE ascertains violations of the believers’ rights in Western Ukraine
November 26, 2015. Deputy Head of the Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) of the OSCE Alexander Hug had a briefing in the Ukrainian crisis media centre. Answering to a question of a journalist about violations of the rights of the believers in Western Ukraine he informed the mass-media that OSCE Special Monitoring Mission picks up all cases of violation of the rights of believers in Ukraine and shares this information with the Secretariat of the OSCE in order that it can take further decisions as the official website of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (UOC MP) reports.
On the 5 of October representatives of the Mission had a meeting with metropolitan of Rivne and Ostrozsk Varfolomey (UOC MP) and clergy of this diocese. The representatives of the Church informed the international organisation about the facts of the violations of the rights of the Orthodox believers in Rivne and Ternopil regions. The metropolitan stressed the illegal actions of some local authorities’ representatives who provoke conflicts on the religious grounds supporting of the captures by the Kivian Patriarchate of religious building of the UOC MP.
The cooperation between the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe has been established since the beginning of 2015.