Federal Security Service in cassocks. Parliament may consider the ban in February – Poturaiev

On January 26th, Friday, the Committee on Humanitarian and Information Policy of the Verkhovna Rada will consider a bill related to restricting the activities of the Moscow Patriarchate in Ukraine. This was reported by the head of the committee, MP Mykyta Poturaiev (“Servant of the People”), to the public initiative “Holka”.

“Tomorrow, the committee will discuss this issue. We have planned to review two projects. One legislative initiative from the president regarding the English language (9432) and a government bill (8371) regarding the activities of religious organizations. I hope that the discussion will be productive, and we will reach an agreement on everything. We have already completed the amendments. The table is ready, but it needs to be handed over to the council’s office, and then the conciliation council will decide,” Poturayev comments.

Some MPs, particularly those supporting the Moscow Patriarchate like Artem Dmytruk (“Restoration of Ukraine”), tried to stall the consideration of this project. They submitted a spam of amendments (in total, there were over 1000 amendments).

Member of the committee, MP Mykola Knyazhitsky (European Solidarity), describes how the consideration of amendments took place.

How were the amendments considered in the committee?

Mykola Knyazhitsky

member of parliament, European Solidarity faction

We rejected the amendments from the proponents of the Russian world. The committee supported some of my proposals regarding the ban on the activities of this agency in Ukraine. We need to pass through the committee as quickly as possible and consider this bill in the session hall.

Member of Parliament Oleksandr Alykseychuk (‘Servant of the People’), who, together with his colleague Yuliia Klymenko (‘Holos’), collected signatures from parliamentarians to bring the issue to the floor for first reading last autumn, emphasizes that the Verkhovna Rada must support the initiative in February, before the second anniversary of the full-scale invasion

When is the parliament supposed to consider the bill?

Oleksandr Aliksiychuk

Member of Parliament, Servant of the People faction

I hope that the bill will come out of the relevant committee and will be included in the agenda of the next session of the Verkhovna Rada by the conciliation council. I believe that the faction and group leaders understand the full responsibility and the society's demand for the adoption of this bill, and no, God forbid, personal interests or relationships between individuals will outweigh the interests of the country, society, and every conscious Ukrainian on the scales of justice. The struggle for faith is another front against Muscovy that we cannot afford to lose.

Yuliia Klymenko succinctly summarized why this bill should be voted on urgently: “It should be passed before the second anniversary because the Muscovites are crawling out of every hole.”

The head of the “Servant of the People” faction, Davyd Arakhamia, has not yet responded to the question of the prospects for the government bill to be included in the agenda of the February session of the Verkhovna Rada. It is he or his deputy Andriy Motovylovets who have decisive influence on the formation of the agenda.

Recall that since the start of the full-scale war, the SBU has exposed over 60 clerics of the UOC-MP who worked for the Russian Federation, selling weapons and child pornography.

Ahead of Ukraine’s Independence Day in 2023, MPs Alykseychuk and Klymenko initiated the collection of signatures in the Verkhovna Rada to bring the government bill to the session hall for the first reading.

Speaker Ruslan Stefanchuk stated that there were not enough votes in parliament to raise this issue. Nevertheless, over 240 signatures were collected for an appeal to Stefanchuk, and ultimately, 267 deputies supported the bill in the first reading. However, it’s worth noting that the card of Igor Guzya (“For the Future”), who actively supported the government bill, did not work. Therefore, de facto, there were 268 votes.