KIEV, January 16. /TASS/. The Kiev authorities are acting "like idiots" in the situation around the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, the Ukrainian Presidential Office’s Advisor Alexey Arestovich said.
"We want to be a normal country, don’t we? Or maybe we want to be idiots for the sake of the very primitive technique of division? It’s a political strategy and not a cultural policy. It’s very simple: we either act like reasonable people or like idiots. So far, we have been acting like idiots who are proclaiming this policy," Arestovich said, commenting on the persecution of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in an interview with a YouTube channel.
The advisor pointed out that the Ukrainian authorities needed "to pull" the Ukrainian Orthodox Church’s members to their side, while "severely persecuting" those who oppose Kiev’s policies.
The Ukrainian Security Service has been conducting searches in the temples of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church across the country. Some of its hierarchs have been charged with high treason, sabotage and propaganda among parishioners.
On December 1, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky enacted the National Security and Defense Council’s decision actually aimed at banning the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. In particular, the president handed down instructions to submit a bill to parliament banning "religious organizations affiliated with centers of influence in the Russian Federation" and scrutinize the Charter governing the Ukrainian Orthodox Church for signs of canonical ties with the Moscow Patriarchate.