The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) has blocked a distribution channel of anti-Ukrainian literature through a network of church shops belonging to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (UOC-MP). Among the seized items were pro-Russian publications promoting religious intolerance and justifying Russia's war against Ukraine.
According to the SBU’s press service, batches of these hostile publications were found in Uzhhorod, Zhytomyr, Mykolaiv, and Kyiv within the premises of one of the UOC-MP church shop networks. The shop owners collectively ordered the propagandist literature from a printing house in the Ternopil region.
A forensic linguistic examination initiated by the Security Service confirmed that the discovered materials justified the armed aggression of Russia against Ukraine and contained calls for interfaith hostility and religious intolerance.
The investigation revealed that the mass distribution of such provocative publications could destabilize the socio-political situation in Ukraine to Russia's advantage. Based on the collected evidence, the owner of one of the shops has been charged under Part 1 of Article 300 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (importation, production, or distribution of works promoting violence and cruelty, racial, national, or religious intolerance and discrimination).
An investigation is ongoing to establish all the circumstances of the crime and to hold all individuals involved in subversive activities against Ukraine accountable.
Comprehensive measures were conducted by SBU officers in the Zakarpattia region in cooperation with the National Police and under the procedural guidance of the regional prosecutor's office.