Religion – Weltanschauung – Recht [ RWR ]

The applicant is a religious community that belongs to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) which, when the application was lodged in 2019, was associated with the Moscow Patriarchate and headed by the Metropolitan of Kyiv and All Ukraine, Onufriy.

The community owns and uses a church building in the village of Ptycha in the Rivne Region. The case concerns the applicant community’s liturgical use and peaceful possession of its church building in the context of a dispute over that building with another religious group.

In 2014 tensions arose between parishioners who had remained part of the UOC and those who followed the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kyiv Patriarchate. A conflict began over the use of the church building, resulting in clashes. In January 2016, the Rivne Town Court seized the church building and banned its use. When that decision was lifted in April 2018, unidentified individuals tried to occupy the church building, causing damage to the building and injuries to one of its parishioners. The following day, the Rivne Town Court seized the building again to prevent further clashes and banned people from using it. In 2018, the applicant community was granted victim status in the investigation of those events but lost their appeals for the ban to be lifted.

The applicant community alleges that the national authorities failed to comply with their obligations under Article 9 (freedom of thought, conscience and religion) and Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 (protection of property) in respect of those events.

• Violation of Article 9

Just satisfaction

• The Court dismissed the applicant community’s claim for just satisfaction.

The Court decided to strike the part of the application concerning the complaint under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 out of its list of cases.

Press release ECHR 229 (2025) 09.10.2025