The Joint Center for Coordination of Search and Liberation of Persons Unlawfully Deprived of Liberty as a Result of Aggression against Ukraine refused to disclose information about requests from Russia to exchange hierarchs and priests of the UOC-MP (a branch of the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine) who are under investigation.
"The requested information is sensitive, and its dissemination may harm the process of releasing captured Ukrainian defenders and illegally detained civilians, as well as the released persons," said the head of the Joint Center, Andriy Pasternak, in response to Glavkom's request.
In particular, the publication was interested in whether the aggressor state is interested in prominent ministers of the UOC-MP against whom criminal cases have been opened. We are talking about the abbot of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, Metropolitan Pavlo (Lebid), the abbot of the Holy Dormition Sviatigorsk Lavra, Metropolitan Arseniy (Yakovenko), Metropolitan Luka (Kovalenko) of Zaporizhzhia and Melitopol of the UOC-MP, and the head of the Cherkasy Diocese of the UOC-MP, Metropolitan Theodosius (Snigirev) of Cherkasy and Kaniv.
As reported previously, Metropolitan Jonathan (Anatoly Yeleckykh) of Tulchyn and Bratslav of the UOC-MP, who was sentenced to five years in prison in Ukraine, was taken to the border with Belarus on June 22, 2024. There he was handed over to representatives of the Russian Federation.
In total, since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, Ukraine has exchanged at least four clergymen of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate for prisoners of war.