"Espionage" trial for disappeared Ukrainian Orthodox priest.
The Russian occupation forces in Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia Region disappeared Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) priest Fr Kostiantyn Maksimov in May 2023. On 29 March 2024, more than 10 months later, the occupation forces' Zaporizhzhia Region Prosecutor's Office said a criminal case against him for alleged "espionage" had been handed to court. If convicted, the 40-year-old priest faces a prison term of 10 to 12 years. "This is terrible!" another UOC priest, Fr Vladimir Saviisky, who knew Fr Kostiantyn, told Forum 18. "But this was to be expected."
More than 10 months after the Russian occupation forces in Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia Region disappeared Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) priest Fr Kostiantyn Maksimov, the occupation forces' Regional Prosecutor's Office announced in late March that he is facing criminal trial for alleged "espionage". If convicted, the 40-year-old priest faces a prison term of 10 to 12 years.
Russian occupation forces disappeared Fr Kostiantyn in May 2023. He is among multiple religious leaders from various religious communities the Russian occupation forces have killed, tortured, and disappeared.
Fr Kostiantyn is being tried under Article 276 ("Espionage") of the Russian Criminal Code. (Russia has illegally imposed its Criminal and Administrative Codes on the parts of Ukraine it has illegally annexed.)
"This is terrible!" another local Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) priest, Fr Vladimir Saviisky, who knew Fr Kostiantyn, told Forum 18. "But this was to be expected. The Russians threatened me with this also. Had they not deported me, I would have been sitting next to him in a prison cell." Fr Vladimir opposed the May 2023 Russian Orthodox Church takeover of the UOC's Berdyansk Diocese, and was force to flee to Ukrainian government-held territory.
Russian occupation forces have a record of fabricating false charges against those they dislike. Two Greek Catholic priests - Fr Ivan Levytsky and Fr Bohdan Heleta – were disappeared in November 2022. Now in 2024 they appear to be facing criminal trial under false charges related to weapons, explosives, and allegedly "extremist" texts the Russian occupation forces claim to have found. The Greek Catholic Exarchate told Forum 18 it has had no recent news on the priests.
Fr Kostiantyn served as priest of the UOC's Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the city of Tokmak in Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia Region. Russian occupation forces detained him in the southern town of Chongar when he attempted to cross the administrative boundary with the occupied Ukrainian territory of Crimea in May 2023.
Artyom Sharlay, the head of the Russian occupiers' Religious Organisations Department at Zaporizhzhia Regional Administration's Social and Political Communications and Information Policy Department, claimed to Forum 18 in October 2023 that Fr Kostiantyn had not wanted the Berdyansk Diocese of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) to move to be an integral part of the Russian Orthodox Church. The Russian Orthodox Church took over the Diocese in May 2023.
Sharlay did not answer his phone on 8 April 2024.
The occupation forces' Zaporizhzhia Region Prosecutor's Office said Fr Kostiantyn's trial is being held at the Russian Zaporizhzhia Regional Court in Melitopol. However, Yelena Shapovalova, the head of the Bar Association in the Russian-occupied part of Zaporizhzhia Region, said the trial will be held at the Crimean Supreme Court in Simferopol.
As of 8 April, the Crimean Supreme Court does not list any trial for Fr Kostiantyn on its website.
Vladimir Polukhin, the Russian-installed head of Zaporizhzhia Regional Court, did not immediately respond to Forum 18's questions:
- When Fr Kostiantyn's trial began or is due to begin;
- Who the judge in the case is;
- Who Fr Kostiantyn's lawyer is.
An official at the occupation forces' Zaporizhzhia Regional Prosecutor's Office told Forum 18 he did not know who the investigator or prosecutor was in the case, who the judge is, whether the trial has already begun, or where Fr Kostiantyn is.
Asked if Fr Kostiantyn has a lawyer, the Prosecutor's Office official said "of course". He said he did not know the lawyer's name or if he was chosen by Fr Kostiantyn or assigned to the case. Yelena Shapovalova said Fr Kostiantyn had been assigned a lawyer during the pre-trial investigation, but declined to name the lawyer.
Meanwhile, after holding them in a detention centre in Russia's Rostov Region, Russia has deported two Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU) priests from the occupied Ukrainian Donetsk Region - Fr Khristofor Khrimli and Fr Andri Chui. Russia deported Fr Khristofor to Georgia in February and Fr Andri in March. An occupation forces' court in Donetsk Region had found both guilty of "illegal missionary activity" in September 2023, fined them and ordered their deportation from the Russian Federation.
Russian occupation officials had – as with UOC priest Fr Vladimir - tried to pressure Fr Khristofor and Fr Andri to transfer from the OCU to the Russian Orthodox Church.
UOC priest's trial for alleged "espionage"
Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) priest Fr Kostiantyn Maksimov is facing criminal trial under the Russian Criminal Code for alleged "espionage," the Russian Prosecutor's Office in the occupied part of Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia Region announced on its website on 29 March 2024. It says the trial is taking place at the Russian Zaporizhzhia Regional Court in the occupied city of Melitopol. It did not say when the trial is starting.
The 40-year-old Fr Fr Kostiantyn was disappeared by Russian occupation forces in May 2023. Multiple religious leaders from various religious communities under Russian occupation have been killed, tortured, and disappeared by the occupation forces.
The 40-year-old Fr Kostiantyn faces charges under Article 276 of the Russian Criminal Code ("Espionage"). This carries a prison term of 10 to 12 years.
It is illegal under international law for Russia to enforce its own laws on occupied Ukrainian territory, as Russia is required to leave Ukrainian law in force.
The Russian-occupied or partially-occupied regions of Ukraine – including Zaporizhzhia where Fr Kostiantyn is facing prosecution - which Russia illegally claimed to have annexed in 2022 – began imposing punishments under Russia's Criminal and Administrative Codes in late 2022 in courts which Russia controls.
Artyom Sharlay, the head of the Russian occupiers' Religious Organisations Department at Zaporizhzhia Regional Administration's Social and Political Communications and Information Policy Department, told Forum 18 in October 2023 that Fr Kostiantyn had not wanted the Berdyansk Diocese of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) to move to be an integral part of the Russian Orthodox Church.
Sharlay did not explain why his claims about Fr Kostiantyn's views on the affiliation of his Diocese could justify the occupation forces' enforced disappearance of him.
Prosecutor's Office claims
The Russian occupation forces' Zaporizhzhia Region Prosecutor's Office claims that in Tokmak between April 2022 and February 2023, Fr Kostiantyn "using an Internet messenger, transmitted to an employee of the Ukrainian security service information with the coordinates of the deployment of Russian air defence technical equipment located in the city and district". The Prosecutor's Office announcement gave no evidence for its claims and made no reference to Fr Kostiantyn's status as a priest.
"The accomplice of the Ukrainian special services was caught transferring confidential data to his overseers in Kyiv," local pro-Russian politician Vladimir Rogov claimed on his Telegram channel on 31 March 2024. "The information leak threatened the security of Russia and all residents of the Zaporizhzhia Region."
Russian occupation forces have a record of fabricating false charges against those they dislike. Two Greek Catholic priests - Fr Ivan Levytsky and Fr Bohdan Heleta – were disappeared in Berdyansk in Zaporizhzhia Region in November 2022.
Both priests now in 2024 appear to be facing criminal trial, under false charges related to weapons, explosives, and allegedly "extremist" texts the Russian occupation forces claim to have found in Berdyansk's Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin.
The Donetsk Exarchate of the Greek Catholic Church – to which Fr Ivan and Fr Bohdan belong – told Forum 18 on 8 April that there has been no news of the two priests.
The official who answered the phone at the occupation forces' Zaporizhzhia Region Prosecutor's Office – who did not give his name – said he did not know who the investigator or prosecutor was in the case, who the judge is, whether the trial has already begun, or where Fr Kostiantyn is. "We have many cases," he told Forum 18 from Melitopol on 4 April.
Asked if Fr Kostiantyn has a lawyer, the Prosecutor's Office official said "of course". He said he did not know the lawyer's name or if he was chosen by Fr Kostiantyn or assigned to the case. "We have no greater rights than the defence side," the official claimed. "Everything will be decided by the court."
Yelena Shapovalova, the head of the Bar Association in the Russian-occupied part of Zaporizhzhia Region, says the Russian authorities appointed a lawyer for Fr Kostiantyn during the pre-trial investigation. "That period has now ended and the lawyer's work thus came to an end," she told Forum 18 from Melitopol on 8 April. She declined to name the lawyer.
Fr Kostiantyn's relatives did not sign an agreement with any lawyer that they had chosen for the pre-trial investigation, Shapovalova added.
Shapovalova said Fr Kostiantyn had been held at the temporary holding centre in Melitopol while the pre-trial investigation was underway. She declined to say where he is now.
The duty official at the Russian Investigative Committee for the occupied part of Zaporizhzhia Region, who did not give his name, refused to say if its investigators had prepared the criminal case against Fr Kostiantyn. "We give no information by phone on individual case," the official told Forum 18 from Melitopol on 8 April. "Still less to people who have no legal right to know."
"This is terrible!" another local UOC priest, Fr Vladimir Saviisky, who knew Fr Kostiantyn, told Forum 18 on 4 April. "But this was to be expected. The Russians threatened me with this also. Had they not deported me, I would have been sitting next to him in a prison cell."
Fr Vladimir was pressured by Russian occupation forces to support the Russian Orthodox Church's takeover of the UOC's Berdyansk Diocese.
Trial in Melitopol or Simferopol?
The occupation forces' Zaporizhzhia Region Prosecutor's Office said the criminal case against Fr Kostiantyn had been handed to the Russian Zaporizhzhia Regional Court in Melitopol.
However, Yelena Shapovalova of the Bar Association in the Russian-occupied part of Zaporizhzhia Region said Fr Kostiantyn's trial would be held not at the Russian Zaporizhzhia Regional Court but at the Crimean Supreme Court in Simferopol in Russian-occupied Crimea. "The court here does not hear such cases," she told Forum 18.
As of 8 April, the Crimean Supreme Court does not list any trial for Fr Kostiantyn on its website.
The Russian occupation forces brought in Vladimir Polukhin from the Russian city of Nizhny Novgorod in June 2023 to head the Russian Zaporizhzhia Regional Court. Forum 18 wrote to him on the morning of 8 April 2024 local time to ask:
- When Fr Kostiantyn's trial began or is due to begin;
- Who the judge in the case is;
- Who Fr Kostiantyn's lawyer is.
Forum 18 received no response by the end of the working day in Melitopol of 8 April.
Seized and put on trial for opposing Russian diocese takeover?
Since 2021, Fr Kostiantyn Maksimov, a priest of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC), has been serving in the Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the city of Tokmak in Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia Region. Russian occupation forces detained Fr Kostiantyn in the southern town of Chongar when he attempted to cross the administrative boundary with the occupied Ukrainian territory of Crimea on 16 May 2023.
Sharlay of the Russian occupiers' Religious Organisations Department at Zaporizhzhia Regional Administration's Social and Political Communications and Information Policy Department, did not answer his phone each time Forum 18 called on 8 April 2024.
In October 2023, Sharlay would not say where Fr Kostiantyn was. "I have not heard that he's left [the Russian-occupied territories]," Sharlay told Forum 18 from Melitopol in October 2023. "He's not serving [as a priest]," he added.
Sharlay also claimed that Fr Kostiantyn had not wanted the Berdyansk Diocese of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) to move to be an integral part of the Russian Orthodox Church. Sharlay did not explain why his claims about Fr Kostiantyn's views on the affiliation of his Diocese could justify the occupation forces' enforced disappearance of him.
Source: forum 18