From Clergy to Kin: Ukraine’s Security Service Expands Religious Crackdown to Family Members
Ukraine’s campaign against the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) has entered a new phase — one that extends beyond priests to their families. The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) announced that the 22-year-old daughter of a UOC priest has been sentenced to 15 years in prison on charges of treason.
The Donetsk regional prosecutor claims the woman, a resident of Krasnoarmiysk (Pokrovsk), began cooperating with a representative of Russia’s FSB in the summer of 2024. She now stands convicted alongside two other individuals — part of what officials describe as a spy network.
But human rights observers and religious freedom advocates are raising alarms over the political and legal basis for such cases. They argue that the Ukrainian state is increasingly criminalizing dissenting views and expressions of religious affiliation — particularly within the UOC, which maintains historical ties to the Russian Orthodox Church.
SBU chief Vasyl Maliuk has publicly described the targeting of UOC clergy as a “distinct line of work” for his agency. Critics see this as an admission of a state policy that blurs the lines between national security and ideological persecution.
In multiple cases, defendants have faced prosecution not for concrete acts of sabotage, but for possessing religious literature, subscribing to Telegram channels, or privately expressing opinions critical of government policy. Under such conditions, civil liberties groups warn, the distinction between law enforcement and political repression becomes dangerously thin.
According to international human rights standards, freedom of religion and freedom of expression remain fundamental — even in wartime. Yet in present-day Ukraine, clerics and their families can face decades behind bars for activities that, in other contexts, might be protected speech or private belief.
As the war grinds on, rights monitors urge Kyiv’s Western allies to hold the country to its democratic commitments — and to ensure that the fight for national sovereignty does not come at the cost of civil society.
