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Priest involved in road accident suspended from work.

The Church is waiting for official results of investigation into the road accident

MOSCOW, August 17 (Itar-Tass) — A priest involved in a road accident at Moscow’s Kutuzovsky Prospect has been suspended from work for a period of investigation, the information department of the Russian Orthodox Church reported on Friday.

The Church is waiting for official results of investigation into the road accident on Moscow’s Kutuzovsky Prospect that occurred on the night to August 16 and claimed the lives of two people.

“If the fact that the clergyman escaped from the accident scene gets confirmed, it’s going to be impossible to find any moral justification to his behavior,” the Synodal information department of the Moscow Patriarchate wrote in its letter of condolences to the relatives of the dead.

The Moscow Patriarchate is going to contribute to investigation in compliance with Russian laws, and a decision on whether Hieromonk Iliya (SEMIN) should be defrocked or continue being in the holy orders will depend on results of this investigation. The patriarchate has denied media reports that the priest was an employee of the property management department of the Moscow Patriarchate.

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