Zelensky increased sanctions against ex-MP Novynskyi and nine other representatives of the UOC MP

President Volodymyr Zelensky increased sanctions against ex-MP Vadym Novinskyi (an abbot of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra Pavlo), as well as eight more representatives of the UOC MP. Additional restrictions were imposed on them.

This is stated in Presidential Decree No. 43/2023.

Two new items were added to the restrictions from December 1 — on the prohibition of actions and transactions with securities, as well as on the termination of cultural, scientific and educational cooperation.

In the previous version of the sanctions, 12 restrictions were imposed on these 10 people, and in the new version — already 14.

• On December 1, President Volodymyr Zelensky informed that the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine instructed the government to submit to the Verkhovna Rada a draft law banning the activities of religious organizations affiliated with Russia in Ukraine.
• At the end of November, the SBU conducted a series of searches in churches, monasteries and laurels of the UOC MP, in particular in Kyiv-Pechersk. After the presidentʼs statement, law enforcement officers began actively conducting searches throughout the country. Servants of the UOC MP are being checked for pro-Russian activities and connections with the occupiers.
• On December 2, the National Security and Defense Council introduced personal sanctions against ex-MP of Ukraine Vadym Novynskyi, a vicar of the Holy Dormition Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra of the UOC Petro Lebed and a number of other priests of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate.