Robert Amsterdam, international lawyer for the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, has published an oped in the Moscow Times detailing the Ukrainian government’s persecution of his clients and arguing for intervention. Amsterdam urges the Ukrainian government to submit their new law on religious cleansing for international review before bodies such as the EU’s Venice Commission. Excerpt below: … Read more
The non-governmental organization Human Rights Watch has issued a statement today highlighting their concerns that Ukraine’s recently passed law which will allow for the banning of an entire religious denomination would violate international human rights law. According to Hugh Williamson, Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch, “the law interferes with the right … Read more
On September 15th, the Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of the United States of America approved a statement regarding the newly passed law in Ukraine which would grant the authorities extraordinary powers to place an outright ban on the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, depriving millions of Ukrainian citizens of their internationally guaranteed rights to religious freedom … Read more
The following letter was distributed to a list of recipients in Washington DC by Robert Amsterdam of Amsterdam & Partners LLP in response to a series of false claims and disinformation issued by Steven Moore, an activist with the Ukraine Freedom Project. A full PDF of the annexes is available to download here. 30 August … Read more
Metropolitan Theodosius of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) has spent the last several years under constant pressure from the Ukrainian secret police, who have detained him on multiple occasions, raided his home and office four times, and issued bogus, politically motivated charges against him. Today he published an opinion article in the Times of London … Read more
On May 3rd, 2024, the lawyers for the Ukrainian Parliament, the Main Legal Department of the Supreme Council of Ukraine (the ‘Legal Department’), provided a legal assessment of Draft Bill 8371(the ‘Law’), a law aiming to ban the religious practices of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (“UOC”). This report on their findings was prepared by Amsterdam … Read more
On 24 April 2024, the Department for External Church Relations received a “Statement in support of Fr. Mykolai Danylevych on his criminal persecution” from Emeritus Professor Dr Thomas Bremer and Professor Dr Regina Elsner (Germany). Below is the text of the Statement. Statement in support of Fr. Mykolai Danylevych on his criminal persecution On April … Read more
The British publication The Tablet is running a story featuring letters from Amsterdam & Partners LLP on the situation of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church as well as mentions of the white paper. Please see the following excerpt below: Legislation effectively to outlaw the UOC is expected to come before the Ukrainian parliament in mid-January. “There … Read more
Robert Amsterdam has published a new oped on the platform CapX, which is a publication of the British think tank, Centre for Policy Studies. An excerpt follows below: In the case of our client, the Holy Synod, key leaders of the church have been jailed on charges that do not even meet the standards of … Read more
The new white paper published by Amsterdam & Partners LLP regarding Ukraine’s illegal persecution of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) has been featured in a report published in the Sunday Telegraph in London. According to the article, entitled, “Zelensky warned over banning ‘historic institution’,” pressure is mounting on Western leaders to intervene to stop the … Read more