The Old Testament rules of war are more humane than the methods of the Russian army – religious scholars

The rules of war prescribed in the Old Testament are more humane than the methods of warfare used by the Russian army. This was talked about by Viacheslav Horshkov, coordinator of cooperation with religious communities of the State Service of Ukraine for Ethnopolitics and Freedom of Conscience, at the briefing “Russia’s War with God,” which was held the day before at the Ukrainian Crisis Media Center.

During the event was organized as part of the “Point 7” project (official name “Promoting Social Cohesion in Ukraine”) in partnership with Vostok SOS and the Center for Civil Liberties with the support of the American Bar Association Rule of Law Initiative in Ukraine (ABA ROLI Ukraine), various issues were discussed to show the process of documenting the destruction of religious buildings during the second stage of the Russian-Ukrainian war.

The main focus of the discussion is that the destruction of religious buildings violates International Humanitarian Law, and the documentation of such crimes is necessary to bring those guilty of war crimes to justice in Ukrainian justice and within the framework of international mechanisms.

“Indiscriminate shelling, which does not have a clearly defined military objective, violates the laws and customs of war. In addition, according to International Humanitarian Law, some types of civil infrastructure objects have a special protected status. These include medical institutions, educational institutions, historical monuments, and other cultural objects; as well as religious buildings,” – emphasized Viacheslav Likhachev, an expert of the Center for Civil Liberties.

“The war that is going on. Now it’s a war of value. Russia’s values lead to the 19th century. The purpose of this war is to destroy our (Ukrainian) identity. Russia replaces reality with its ideological superstructure. Due to the criminal actions of the Russian army, the religious diversity of Ukraine is being destroyed,” – noted Ihor Kozlovsky, religious scholar, and senior researcher at the Religious Studies Department of the H.S. Skovoroda Institute of Philosophy of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine

The theses of the speakers mentioned above were also supported by Ruslan Khalikov, religious scholar and head of the “Religion in Fire” project of the Workshop of Academic Religious Studies. “The destruction of religious buildings is not just a violation of International Humanitarian Law; it’s a violation of human rights to freedom of conscience. And this violation is a war crime. In Ukraine, there is absolute freedom of religion. In Russia, the approach is more centralized. Russia is attacking religious freedom, attempting to impose the Russian social model,” – he added, commenting on the situation.

It is worth emphasizing that religious buildings often also have significant historical and cultural value. “The destruction of religious buildings in many denominations due to the peculiarities of the creed makes it impossible to hold a full-fledged cult; that is, the freedom of religion of significant groups of the population is also violated,” – the religious expert summarized.

Ukrainian public organizations and state authorities make considerable efforts to document cases of damage and destruction of places of worship in the course of full-scale Russian aggression. This task becomes even more complicated because of the challenging access to the areas of intensive hostilities, the lack of technical capacity for communicating with people on the sites, and the danger for them if such information is transferred to line organizations and the very contracts themselves. Furthermore, unlike objects of educational or healthcare infrastructure, religious facilities are not joined into a single organization (even more so, a state one), which would collect information centrally through previously established channels

It is the absence of such a centralized accounting system that leads to a fairly noticeable difference in information regarding the destruction of religious buildings.

According to the Institute for Religious Freedom, at least 249 religious buildings suffered from the Russian invasion of Ukraine. 220 cases were documented as part of the “Religion on Fire” Project by the Workshop for Academic Study of Religion, implemented jointly with the Congress of National Communities of Ukraine. According to the data of the State Service of Ukraine for Ethno-Politics and Freedom of Conscience, invaders damaged at least 183 religious buildings in Ukraine. The coalition of NGOs “Tribunal for Putin,” documented 129 such cases. According to the last report from the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, 74 places of worship were damaged during the full-scale Russian aggression.

The difference in quantitive data can be explained by insufficient coordination and exchange of information between the initiatives and various methodological approaches. Some initiatives record the case only after direct inspection of the damaged object; others deem it possible to document a fact based on the photo and video footage, as well as testimony provided by eyewitnesses or even messages in the media and on social networks. In addition, the documenting process poses some objective difficulties.

Experts also talked about the foreign policy dimension of the problem. In the geopolitical arena, Moscow has taken a lot of propaganda efforts to accuse Kyiv of violations of the rights of national and religious minorities. In this context, it is essential to note numerous facts of shelling of mosques, synagogues and places of worship of other religious groups. 100% of synagogues were damaged or ruined completely in a number of regions. The only Karaite kenesa in the territory of “continental” Ukraine is a religious building of the small ethno-confessional group, which is a branch of Judaism in religious terms. In Ukraine, Karaites are recognized as indigenous people, which under the norms of international law and UN requirements presupposes a careful attitude to their cultural and historical heritage – told Viacheslav Likhachov.

Summarizing the results of the briefing, possible to note – both orthodox churches and places of worship of various minorities face imminent danger as a result of a full-scale Russian invasion. Pretending to adhere to some religious values and shaping ideology supposedly based on certain spiritual “societal glue”, Russia actually wages a deadly war against God, religion and freedom of conscience. This is confirmed by the collected and analyzed facts of the destruction of places of worship. Certainly, all aspects of violations of international humanitarian law should be documented for a future trial of war criminals.