International Desk

Mass violations of human rights and religious freedoms are taking place in Ukraine, where the Church is being persecuted and historical memory is being abused, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in a welcome message to Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and all Russia, the team of Emir Kusturica’s documentary "People of Christ. Our time," and the guests of the film’s Russian premiere.

"Created by our Serb friends, the documentary is a testimony of the tragic events taking place in Ukraine, which involve mass violations of human rights and religious freedoms, the desecration of historical memory, and the persecution of the Orthodox Church by the Kiev regime," the message reads.

The Russian president emphasized that an increasing number of people around the world were coming to understand the true causes of the conflict in Ukraine, unleashed by the Western elites, as well as the fact there is no excuse for crimes against civilians, ethnic and religious cleansings, terrorist attacks and punitive actions by neo-Nazis.

He pointed out that the documentary’s premiere in the Serbian capital of Belgrade had caused a wide public response because no one could be indifferent to reflections on what is going on honestly shared by people from various countries, including Serbia, Italy, Russia and Ukraine, with priests, poets, writers, teachers, TV hosts and young people among them. "It’s very important that the picture gives us hope and inspires confidence that we will be able to give an appropriate response to any challenge as long as we preserve solidarity and traditional spiritual and moral values bequeathed to us by our ancestors," the head of state added.

Serbian film director Emir Kusturica presented his documentary "The People of Christ. Our Time" in Belgrade in September. The film is dedicated to the fate of christianity in today’s world and the persecution of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church by the Kiev authorities.