A facility not listed on official city plans is being built on the site of a historic Catholic cemetery in Minsk. According to several sources, the site will house an educational institution of the KGB, namely a new building for the Academy of National Security.
This was reported by Katolik.life.
During construction, numerous human remains buried there were unearthed. Authorities had promised to hand them over to the parish for reburial, but according to believers this has still not happened. Weekly parish announcements for a long time included the prayer appeal: “That the remains of our ancestors buried at the Zolotogorsk Cemetery may not be destroyed.”
However, this prayer has no longer appeared in the announcements in recent months.
As LF previously reported, three Catholic priests who are citizens of Poland and had served in Belarus for many years were forced to leave the country. Authorities refused to extend their permission for further ministry. All of them served in the Vitsebsk Diocese.
As LF also reported, Catholic priest Anatoliy Parakhnevich, rector of the parish in Olkovichi, was detained.
Earlier, state propaganda media had mentioned the priest in a negative context following his participation in a reception marking Poland’s Constitution Day, held at the Ukrainian embassy in Minsk, attempting to portray it as something suspicious.
It later became known that Anatoliy Parakhnevich had suffered a heart attack. The 65 year old cleric remains in a detention centre in serious condition. According to Belarusian believers, Parakhnevich is accused of “treason against the state”. No details have been disclosed. It is believed that the priest is being held in the KGB pre trial detention centre.
Earlier, a Catholic priest and two evangelical presbyters were detained in Belarus.
As LF reported, two Polish Catholic priests who had served for many years in the Brest Region were forced to leave Belarus.
As LF also reported, authorities in Belarus, acting on a KGB decision, arrested and sold the property of Catholic priest Genrikh Okolotovich. The clergyman was convicted of “treason against the state” and released two years later following a petition from the Holy See.
As is known, authorities in the Brest Region liquidated all parishes of the Greek Catholic Church. The court ruling referred to an alleged “threat to national interests”.
Earlier we reported that after re registration under new legislation, the number of religious communities in Belarus declined. In the Mogilev Region, half of Catholic parishes ceased operations following re registration. In the Vitsebsk Region, 85 Roman Catholic communities remained instead of the previous 94, while in the Brest Region there were 60 instead of 66.
As LF reported, authorities did not allow former rector of the Catholic parish of the Red Church in Minsk, priest Vladislav Zavalnyuk, to conduct a service at the sarcophagus of the church’s founder Edward Voinilovich.
