KYIV – Kyiv’s SBU security service said on April 24 it suspected a high-ranking cleric and head of east Ukraine’s main monastery of having revealed army positions to Russian forces.

The SBU said it had “served a notice of suspicion to the metropolitan of the Sviatogirsk Lavra monastery who ‘tipped off’” Russian forces about Ukrainian positions in the Donetsk region.

Metropolitan Arseniy is listed as the head of the mediaeval monastery.

Ukraine has for years accused the Moscow-linked branch of its Orthodox church of sowing separatist sentiment.

The SBU said Metropolitan Arseniy was suspected of “disseminating information about the movement or location of armed forces” – a crime punishable by up to eight years in prison.

He had “handed over to the occupiers the location of defence forces checkpoints in the Kramatorsk district of the Donetsk region”, it said in its statement.

It also said the cleric had promoted “pro-Kremlin narratives about the war in Ukraine even before the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion”.

The Sviatogirsk monastery stands on a bank of the Siverskyi Donets River.

It was damaged by shelling in March 2022, at the start of the invasion. AFP