Russia: Church vandalized and demolished

Today, September 6, a group of unidentified people vandalized and demolished Holy Trinity Evangelical church in Moskow, Starostina Str., Novokosino Area.

Around midnight a group of about 50 people including several policemen, burst into the church’s territory. There was a church’s security, a young female, whom they escorted to the police precinct and held her for about 3 hours; meanwhile the church’s building was completely destroyed. “All church’s belongings were stolen”, - stated pastor Vasiliy Romanyuk. “They stole our sound equipment, which cost about 100.000 Rub (about $3,100) and crushed the windows of a parked car on the property.

When pastor Vasiliy and other leaders arrived, they were physically confronted by unidentified people, who pushed them out of the church territory and threw stones at them. Then bulldozers arrived and destroyed the building.

Raiders presented itself as bailiffs and “people’s militia”, who came to enforce a dispossession proceeding from the year of 2005, said pastor Vasiliy Romanyuk. No court orders or any other documents were presented. Six police officers (Kostino-Ukhtomskiy precinct) stood nearby and didn’t interrupt raiders despite the fact that Christians were begging them to stop such lawlessness. 

“Sometime I hear people cursing, but those people are cursing so horribly and cold-blooded, I’ve never heard in my life” - continued pastor. He mentioned that he found a Molotov cocktail bottle not far from the church facility. 

It’s still unclear who were the raiders, because there are no official comments on this matter. Individuals who called themselves “people’s militia” wear no badge and no signs, as well as bulldozers that didn’t carry any license plates or logos. 

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Forum 18 News Service found a history of this church:
Holy Trinity Church was established in 1979 by Serafim Marin, a Pentecostal who had spent 18 years in Soviet labour camps for his faith. It gained registration with the Soviet authorities as an autonomous Pentecostal community in the late 1970s. However, the city authorities forced it out of its first building in 1995. The replacement "temporary" church – bulldozed today - was built on the current site in 1995-6.

Officials consistently refused to legalise the building and prevented it from being linked to the water and electricity supply and sewerage. Holy Trinity's Pastor, Vasili Romanyuk, and the congregation have long battled to save their church from confiscation and destruction. "We put a lot of our resources into this building," he told Forum 18.