Turkish Forum

Tag: Ukraine

  • The political control over religion in Ukraine is rising amid the Easter

    The political control over religion in Ukraine is rising amid the Easter

    Montenegro Church
    Orthodox Church in Montenegro

    Known for a controversial political situation the current confrontation of the political and religious institutes in Ukraine are on the agenda today.

    Earlier in February, the split in the Ukraine became one of the main topics at the meeting of Primate and representatives of the Local Churches, devoted to the problems of inter-Orthodox unity in Amman, Jordan. The Primate of the Ukrainian Church, Metropolitan Onufry, contrary to the opinion of the “autocephalous” lobby inside the Institute stated that the canonical autocephaly that is the only “right” autocephaly in Ukraine.“Today, some say that a powerful means to avoid the split in tthe Ukraine’s Chhurch is to receive autocephalous status for the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. I want to be honest with God and my conscience and I’ll say: I’m sure that the autocephalous status of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church will only foster the split. Some may return to the fold of the canonical Church, but not all. Autocephaly does not guarantee the absolute unity. And the autocephalous Churches existing in the world have their own splits, ”he said. In fact, Metropolitan Onufry once again demonstrated his support for the unity of the Russian Orthodox Church, an integral part of which is the integral part of the canonical Ukrainian Church.

    After the brief in Amman, the Kiev metropolitan went to Montenegro, which is also far from accidental. Back in Amman, the spiritual leader of the Orthodox Montenegro, Metropolitan of Montenegro-Primorsky Amphilochius spoke about the parallels between the situations in Montenegro and Ukraine.“There was a time when the people and their sovereigns were Orthodox, baptized. After the Bolshevik revolution in Russia and our revolution in Yugoslavia, as in many other countries, the states became secular. During this time, the Communists created new nations, for us it is the “Macedonian nation”, the “Montenegrin” … Many nations were separated from previously united Orthodox peoples. Probably, the Patriarch of Constantinople simply did not think about this when he began to build Ukrainian autocephaly on modern secular rules rather than ancient Orthodox principles, ”he said.

    Every Sunday and Thursday in many cities of Montenegro, mass processions and prayers are held against the law on religious associations and in support of the Serbian Orthodox Church. Montenegrin police do not announce the total number of participants or data by region. According to opposition estimates, about 200 thousand people participated in the last peaceful processions and prayers, with a population of about 630 thousand.

  • Ukraine’s struggle for “independent” church: is the deal really worth it?

    The Ukrainian Orthodox Church continues a struggle for becoming fully self-governing, or autocephalous, and is seeking the support of the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople.

    Yet, Ecumenical Patriarch Dimitri Bartholomew said he was not happy with the failure of Ukraine President Pytro Poroshenko to invite 25 ruling bishops to join a new formation of the Orthodox Church in Ukraine. So far, there is only one Metropolitan Simeon (Shostatsky) of Vinnitsa and Bar who has joined the newly-formed Church structure. According to the Poroshenko’s proposal to Bartholomew, the new Church would unite 43 parishes including 33 parishes of Kiev Patriarchate, 9 parishes of Ukrainian Autocephalous Church and 1 parish of Moscow Patriarchate.

    Earlier this year, Bartholomew requested $20 Million from Poroshenko to support his plan for an independent Church. Bartholomew also demanded that a new autocephalous church would operate in accordance with the Fener law that warrants absolute subjection to Constantinople Patriarchate.

    Bartholomew also added that the Istanbul-based Patriarchate granted independence status to the Russian Church in the 16th century and then to the Orthodox churches of the Czech Republic and Slovakia in 1998, Istanbul-based Anadolu Agency reported.

    However, the deal might not be as good as it seems for Ukraine: after gaining independence Greece will own all 6000 parishes of Kiev Patriarchate leaving Ukrainian Patriarch Filaret empty-handed and with no Russian Orthodox Church support.

  • Ukrainian President peculated $15 million donation

    Ukrainian President peculated $15 million donation

    Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko allegedly peculated $15 million supposed to be donated to set up the Uniting Orthodox Church in Ukraine, an investigative journalist from a reliable source reported.

    5351923 original

    Prior to the Poroshenko’s visit to Istanbul several wealthiest Ukrainian businessmen donated $25 million to facilitate and speed up the process of creation of the Uniting Orthodox Church in Ukraine. The amount was supposed to be spent as a reward for Varfolomey, the Patriarch of Constantinople for publishing the Tomos on autocephaly of the Ukranian Orthodox Church. However, during the meeting with the Ukrainian President the Patriarch received only $10 million. The rest of the sum Poroshenko reportedly “peculated”.

    Meanwhile, on July 28 Ukraine is going to celebrate the 1030th anniversary of Christianization of Russia. To mark the celebration the Patriarch of Constantinople was going send a delegation to Ukraine, but the visit was cancelled. Should the Patriarch confirm the peculation of the donation by Poroshenko, Kiev might be involved in quite an unlikely scandal with the Orthodox Church Institute.

  • Ukraine on the brink of losing its last values

    Ukraine on the brink of losing its last values

    ukraineWith the current political regime and the policy that contradicts to the Ukraine’s national identity the country seems to be once again on the brink of a religious war. The conflict that started last year between the Ukraine’s Institute of Church and the national Parliament, The Verkhovna Rada, is getting to the new extreme today.

    A number of Ukrainian politicians representing the political party “Svoboda” along with some members of the Rada have requested the Ukraine’s Ministry of culture for religious affairs to change the official name of the Ukrainian Orthodox church for the “Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine” claiming that Moscow had “grabbed” the Ukrainian national shrines. The move is allegedly explained by the growing Russian “aggression” in the Crimea and the Ukrainian region of Donbass.

    According to experts from the Ukrainian Analytical Institute for policy management, the claims should be regarded as a typical blackmail policy aiming to undermine Russia’s credibility in Ukraine and among the Ukrainian authorities. Experts also suggest that the real reason behind these claims is to get the control over the Church and 12 million of its members to secure the victory of the ruling party in the upcoming elections. The fact that the Ukrainian Orthodox Church does not fall under the regulation of the Ukrainian Parliament by its Constitution adds even more irony to the overall situation.

    However, such policy can lead to much more dramatic outcomes and destruct one of the last national values that still holds the country together – the people’s faith. Known for its deep cultural background defined by its history and religion that find its roots back in the 10th century the dominant part of the Ukrainian population is orthodox Slavic people who accurately keep their traditions and culture. Once they are destroyed the entire country might disappear from the map.

  • EU’s bitter lessons

    EU’s bitter lessons

    europe crisisThe European Union continues to struggle with its economic and migration crises. The huge debt, obsolete political and economic regulations and inability to manage its migration policy are important alerts for the EU indicating the Brussels’s need to change its compass, says Pino Arlacchi, Member of the European Parliament.

    By pursuing the US political course in the Syria war, the EU did not get any visible profit. Instead, it was left alone to cope with the increasing flows of illegal migrants posing safety threats for the EU citizens.

    Indeed, The Syrian scenario is very much alike to the one in Afghanistan in 1979. When the Soviet army entered in 1979 trying to set up a friendly government in the country and altering the Cold War balances in the region, The United States, Saudi Arabia, and other countries started arming the anticommunist Afghan militia groups. The country was flooded with weapons while most of those weapons were in hands of Taliban. Shortly after that the US became the number one enemy for Afghanistan, says Arlacchi.

    During the Syria war, the US have once again learned the bitter lesson as they did in Afghanistan. However, the Syrian opposition is so diverse and uncontrolled that its arming could have much tragic consequences. This is why the US used Saudi Arabia and Qatar as a sort of a liaison to keep the balance in the region. But we also saw the conflict between Saudi Arabia and Qatar that split the countries apart. Obviously, the strategic alliance of Iran, Russia and Turkey has played a crucial role in the Syria war. All the countries could be able to gain the trust from both people and decision-making powers in the region. At the same time the US along with the EU received little credibility from the Syrian government.

    Moreover, the EU is swamped with its internal issues that it faces the risk of splitting apart. Ironically it may be, but with integrity being its main value, The European Union is falling apart today. A huge debt of Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Cyprus and other EU’s members and their inability to repay it explains the attempts of those countries to boycott the Brussels’s regulations.

    According to Arlacchi, the world is changing its compass and the EU has to adapt to it. The West is losing its role of the world economic and political dictator due to its huge debt and ineffective policy. Instead, China and Eurasia are on the rise today.

  • Kazakhstan and Nazarbayev in the Light of the Developments in Crimea

    Kazakhstan and Nazarbayev in the Light of the Developments in Crimea

    The Western actors were almost shocked with the annexation of Crimea to Russia through Putin’s play chess tactics. The latest events that are going on in some cities of Ukraine next to Russia could also be seen as a part of this game. Russian supporters already got the controls of some cities of Ukraine and put the Russian flags on some public buildings. At this stage it could be expected that only Russia which “swallowed” Crimea could solve the conflict. It is possible that the choice of cooperation with Putin may be put on the agenda in order not to let Ukraine to divide and more blood to be shed.
    Generally the poblems come to the political agenda and become a part of political studies only after they occured. However there is capability of foreseeing and taking precautions or agenda setting behind grand strategies. That’s why the strategy that is implemented by Nazarbayev in Northern KazakhstAlaeddin Yalçınkayaan which has similiar characteristics with Crimea is one of the greatest in this field.
    The milestone in the disintegration process of the USSR had astonished Russian nationsalists very much. Furthermore socialists outside the USSR had wanted that “dramatic dream” to come to end as soon as possible. When there was a coup d’etat attempt in Moscow on 19 June 1991, because Gorbachev had violated the main principles of socialism, one of the prominent scholars of Turkey wrote in his column that “the real communism will come from then, and nobody should wait Soviet Union to be disintegrated. However only two days were enough this attempt to be declared as failure.
    After the failed coup the republics declared their independences. At that time Ukraine’s (to which Crimea was given as a present in 1954) declaration of independence in 1991 was not a serious problem for Russia. In fact, the three Slavic republics namely Russia, Belarussia and Ukraine were the co-founders of Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) before Almatı Declaration. Even though Russian strategists had various worries about the future.
    At the phase of the deconstruction of Berlin Wall and the disintegration of Warsaw Pact, instabilities in the republics started to be seen and in 1990 they declared their sovereignty one after one. It was a great step towards independence which was reached in 1991.
    A Russian physicist Alexandre Soljenitsyne, in one of his article written on 18 September 1990, wrote that eastern and northern parts of Kazakhstan where Russians were in majority were in fact part of Russia, therefore if the USSR disintegrates this region should be returned to Russian Federation. The reason of this physicist who had to live in camps in Kazakhstan because of his activities against communist regime was very interesting: This region is historically part of Russia, due to the maps which were drawn by “unconscious” communist leaders it is seen within the boundaries of Kazakhstan. In fact the Russian population in the region was the people who were migrated there in Tsarist era especially in 1950s as a result of the “Project of Virgin Lands” for the Russification of the land and therefore historically there were no evidence that the region was a “Russian land”. Those claims of Soljenitsyne were also taken up by some of the institutions and politicians and got their place in the agenda. In those regions Russian population were almost 80% of the whole population and the weight of Russians in Kazakhstan’s politics, economy and technology was very big. Even in military and at decision makers’ levels in the country the effects of Russians very decisive. After all, due to various problems, especially the economic ones Russia faced, Moscow had to recognize the independences and existing boundaries of the republics and establish new forms of cooperation like CIS without taking into consideration the above mentioned discussions.
    Nazarbayev who is still the President of Kazakhstan, by taking into consideration the future dangers, gave priority to confidence and coperation based policies in its relation with Russia. The charter (Almatı Declaration) of the CIS which was also the product of those worries and precautions was signed in the capital city of Kazakstan in those days as a diplomatic masterpiece of Nazarbayev. Nazarbayev moved the capital city of his country from Almatı to Akmola that is situated in Northern Kazakhstan in 1994. He changed the name of the capital city as Astana in 1998. He encouraged the settlement of youngsters in the city which had a population of 10.000 at the beginning. Throughout the 1990s, as in many other republics, a great deal of Russians in Kazakhstan also found a way to migrate to Russia. During that period Nazarbayev administration pursued relations with Russia in cooperation and confidence. He performed a very successful “soft power” policy that could be tought at political science lectures.
    If the Ukraine leaders took the example of Kazakhstan policy that made Kazakhstan to keep the region where Russian population is in majority under their control and to keep apart from the aggressive policies of Russia to which it shares 6.477 km borders, there was no need to have all these not-yet completed bloody events and happenings in Ukraine. The main misfortune of Ukraine here is its being a neighbour of EU and its trust to western organizations. This misfortune as for many other countries could be defined as becoming a toy for the great powers in strategically important areas, not to be able to put forward one’s own real position and policies.
    We should also specify that the Kazakhstan’s move to get the issue of possible allegations of Russian in Russian populated areas in Kazakhstan from the agenda, was not a great loss for Russia. On the contrary, Russia and Russians benefitted from that process. If, for example, the conflicts reached to the point of “hot conflict”, even if Russia that was strong once upon a time won, just because of the reciprocal revenge feelings, both sides would loose like in Ukraine. The developments funded by Soros did not bring peace and ease to that country. One should not also depend on KGB supported ones.

    alaeddin.yalcinkaya@marmara.edu.tr