House arrest is being prepared for the elder of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra in Ukraine

The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) informed today one of the most important Orthodox priests there that he is suspected of justifying Russian aggression during a major dispute over a well-known monastery, and is threatened with house arrest.

The dispute over the monastery's property is part of a wider religious conflict that is taking place alongside the war.

Metropolitan Pavlo, who is the abbot of the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra monastery, the most famous Orthodox landmark in Ukraine, refused to leave it even though the authorities ordered him to do so.

This Sunday, he cursed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and threatened him with a "curse".

At a hearing in a court in Kyiv, the metropolitan rejected claims by the SBU that he approved of the Russian invasion and said the charges were politically motivated.

The SBU raided the abbot's home in the monastery, and the prosecution asked the court to place him under house arrest while the investigation is ongoing.

The monks in that monastery belong to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which is accused of being affiliated with the Russian Orthodox Church, whose leader, Patriarch Kirill, supports Russian President Vladimir Putin and his invasion of Ukraine.

The Ukrainian Orthodox Church claims loyalty to its country, condemned the Russian invasion and declared itself independent from Moscow.

But the SBU claims that some in that church maintain close ties with Moscow. During the raids, they found Russian rubles, passports and leaflets with messages from the Moscow patriarch as proof that some Ukrainian church officials are loyal to Russia.

The Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra monastery is owned by the Ukrainian government, and the agency that oversees it has notified the monks that it is terminating the lease and that they have until Wednesday to leave.

Metropolitan Pavlo told the faithful on Wednesday that the monks will not leave the monastery until there is a verdict on the lawsuit filed by his Orthodox Church in a court in Kyiv, with the aim of stopping the eviction.

The authorities claim that the monks violated the lease rules by altering parts of the historical monument and also committed technical violations. The monks reject these claims as an excuse for persecution.

Many Orthodox communities in Ukraine severed ties with the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and transferred to the rival Orthodox Church of Ukraine, which received autocephaly more than four years ago from the Ecumenical Patriarch, Bartholomew I, but Russian Patriarch Kirill and most other Orthodox patriarchs refused to accept this. his decision.