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Kiev mayor revokes previous resolution to strip Moscow Orthodox church of benefits

On Wednesday the Kiev City Council stripped the Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchy of taxation benefits

© ITAR-TASS/Sergei Bobylev

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KIEV, January 29. /TASS/. Kiev Mayor and head of the Kiev city administration Vitali Klitschko has revoked a previous resolution passed by the Kiev City Council which denied benefits to a branch of the Ukrainian Orthodox church which belongs to the Moscow patriarchy.

Klitschko told journalists that as the head of the Kiev city administration he had signed a draft resolution that revokes the discriminatory act. "Today, when tension remains high in society we shall create no grounds for splitting society for ethnic, language or religious reasons," Klitschko said.

On Wednesday the Kiev City Council stripped the Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchy of taxation benefits. "I did not vote for that resolution; it has no legal force because it violates the Ukrainian Constitution which envisages in Article 24 that all citizens of Ukraine have equal rights and freedoms and that all of them are equal to the law. There can be neither benefits nor limitations as regards one's nationality or religious faith," Klitschko said.

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