“Kremlin persecuting religious communities in Crimea and ORLDO” - Bill submitted to US Congress regarding support of religious freedom in Ukraine

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Марина ПищулинаQHA media
16 December 2019, 16:45
Марина ПищулинаQHA media
16 December 2019, 16:45

Two American congressmen Joe Wilson and Emanuel Cleaver today, December 16, introduced a draft law on supporting religious freedom in Ukraine, including in the occupied Crimea and parts of Donbass.

According to Cleaver, the Kremlin is harassing peaceful religious communities on the annexed peninsula and in the ORLDO "even more cruel and extensive than in Russia," Voice of Americareports.

The document refers to the fact that violations by the Russian Federation are directed mainly against the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, Protestants and Jehovah's Witnesses.

According to Joe Wilson, the mayhem of the Kremlin should entail consequences.

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“The Russian government violates international humanitarian law and international obligations to respect and protect religious freedoms. Russian officials are responsible and this bill will help bring them to justice,” said the congressman.

According to the bill, the American president will be obliged to take into account the violation of the rights of believers in the territories occupied and controlled by the Kremlin when deciding whether to include the Russian Federation in the list of countries whose actions are of particular concern in this area.

In November this year, the Verkhovna Rada Commissioner for Human Rights, Lyudmila Denisova, appealed to the UN monitoring mission in Ukraine and the OSCE to immediately take measures to restore the rights of residents of annexed Crimea to freedom of conscience and religion.

Earlier, Ukraine’s UN Charge d'Affaires Yury Vitrenko at a UN Security Council meeting spoke about the persecution of believersof all faiths and denominations except the Moscow Patriarchate in the occupied territories of Ukraine.

QHA media reported, that on June 5, Viktor Stashevsky, the Head of the local branch of the Jehovah’s Witnesses organization, was detained in annexed Sevastopol.