S14 cuts off door locks and seizes the UOC temple in Olenovka

Holy Ascension Church in the village Olenovka, Borzna district

Most of the believers in the village were against the transition to the OCU, the parishioners surrounded the temple and tried to halt the radicals who had come to the temple with the intention of cutting locks or taking away keys, told the UOJ secretary of Nezhin eparchy, Fr. Valery Dashko.

Activists who were just a few at first, about 15 people, threatened to use force and the parishioners eventually went home.

Taking advantage of this, the nationalists “called for reinforcements” from Nezhin: several buses arrived at the temple with members of the “holy church of Ukraine” and S14.

At 12 pm right-wing radicals cut the locks with a grinder and seized the temple.

The rector of the temple tried to record what was happening on video, but he was not allowed.

On January 15, a community meeting was held in Olenovka, which was attended by about 25 people who were not Olenovka residents. They demanded to put to the vote the issue of transition of the local religious community from the UOC to the OCU. The village head put the question to the vote but only two of the local residents lobbied it, another 24 votes were given by the OCU supporters who had arrived at the venue, and another 11 votes were arbitrarily added to the minutes.

As the UOJ reported, earlier members of the radical group S14 complained that in Chernigov not a single religious community had joined the OCU yet, so they offered “to facilitate it”.

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