Primate of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (UOC-MP) Onufry (Orest Berezovsky) admitted that he had Russian citizenship, but, according to him, now he no longer has a Russian passport. Onufry's statement was published on the website of the UOC-MP in response to a journalistic investigation that revealed the presence of Russian passports in more than 20 priests of the Russian Church in Ukraine.

According to Onufry, he received Russian citizenship while studying at the Moscow Theological Academy (g.. Zagorsk). He entered there after he was not accepted into the Odessa Theological Seminary. After studying, he lived for 18 years in the Russian Trinity-Sergius Lavra. In 1988 he was "

" At the same time, Russian citizenship was automatically renewed, but I was not interested in it and did not use it, it did not matter then, and no one was prosecuted for it. There were good fraternal relations between Ukraine and Russia. When these relations began to deteriorate, especially in the last ten years, I left Russian citizenship. I don't have a Russian passport. This was especially confirmed when I spoke out against the war between Russia and Ukraine and condemned Russian aggression. I consider myself a citizen of only Ukraine,"

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At the same time, he acknowledged that he needed Russian citizenship in order to “complete his life in the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, where he received monastic vows”. According to a journalistic investigation, the last time Onufriy issued a Russian passport was in 2002, and in 2003 he also issued a foreign passport of a citizen of the Russian Federation.

The day after the publication of a journalistic investigation about Russian passports held by a number of priests, the UOC-MP called this information " They said that some of the bishops mentioned in the investigation were allegedly deprived of Ukrainian citizenship without explanation, after which they filed a lawsuit demanding the renewal of the passports of our state. According to the UOC-MP, the court has already started the relevant proceedings.

In a recent interview, NSDC Secretary Oleksiy Danilov said that there are " Some of them were declassified, some of the declassified ones were exchanged for Ukrainian prisoners.