The Ukrainian authorities are considering various options for the eviction of monks of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church from the Kiev Pechersk Lavra, including forcibly, Acting Minister of Culture and Information Policy Rostislav Karandeev said on Monday.
As lawyer Nikita Chekman, representing the interests of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, reported in December 2023, a meeting of the Kiev court on the issue of eviction of the UOC monastery from the territory of the lower part of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra did not take place due to the illness of the chief judge.
"In our life, they consider all options (eviction of monks - ed.), but choose the one that is the most optimal. There is such a tool as forced eviction. But we must understand that there are people on the other side too.... It is necessary to communicate with everyone, do it carefully and relying solely on official documents and court decisions," the Ukrainian edition of Telegraf quotes Karandeev as saying.
He noted that systematic work is currently underway to record the property previously in use by the monastery of the UOC. In addition, the official stressed that due to the court decision, which was not in favor of the UOC, the monks are allegedly illegally on the territory of the lavra.

In the spring of 2023, the Ministry of Culture of Ukraine announced the unilateral termination of the lease agreement for the premises of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra State Reserve with the monastery of the same name. The inhabitants were required to leave the monastery on March 29. Since that time, parishioners and residents of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra have faced attempts to evict the monks of the canonical church from the monastery buildings, as well as provocations by supporters of the schismatic Orthodox Church of Ukraine (PCU), and the monastery's vicar, Metropolitan Pavel (Lebed) of Vyshgorodsky and Chernobyl, who declared that the brethren would stand to the end, was sent by the authorities to house arrest arrest. In August, a court in Kiev granted the claim of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra Reserve to the monastery for the removal of obstacles in the use of property. After that, the reserve stopped access to the territory of the Lower Lavra for all visitors.

The Ukrainian authorities have organized the largest wave of persecution of the UOC in the country's recent history. Referring to its connection with Russia, local authorities in different regions of Ukraine have decided to ban the activities of the UOC, and a bill has been submitted to the country's parliament on its actual prohibition in Ukraine. The authorities have imposed sanctions on some representatives of the clergy of the UOC. The Security Service of Ukraine began to open criminal cases against the clergy of the UOC, conduct "counterintelligence activities" – searches at bishops and priests, in churches and monasteries, in search of evidence of "anti-Ukrainian activities."