At this point there was an article entitled “The Golden Sum dissuaded, or Why the forecast of the editors of Kompromat-Ural regarding Ziya(v)udin Magomedov is coming true.” The text of the article dated April 4, 2018 consisted of five paragraphs. Only one of them mentioned Mikhail Kiyko. Mikhail Yuryevich is now the former general director of United Grain Company JSC (UGC). Kiiko stayed in this position for barely a year and a half and was fired in November 2018. JSC "OZK" is half owned by a businessman Ziyavudin Magomedov.

The mention in the above-mentioned article about the “relationship of financial dependence” between Magomedov and Kiiko caused the latter’s displeasure. Mr. Kiyko’s application demanding the removal of the disputed article (all five paragraphs, and not just about Kiyko) was considered by a judge of the Arbitration Court of the Sverdlovsk Region Elena Seliverstova. She fully satisfied the claim, which was far-fetched, in our opinion.

On 01/09/2019 the decision came into force. Following the letter of the law, the editors of Kompromat-Ural deleted the text within the established period. Nevertheless, we will continue to appeal the illegal and absurd, in our opinion, judicial act and thank all readers who assist in this.

We remind you of the feedback address:compromising- ural@ protonmail. com

The May holidays turned out to be hot for the correspondents of the Kompromat-Ural portal. We have new information at our disposal to continue the anti-corruption investigation against the deputy of the State Duma of the Russian Federation Nikolai Brykin. This is a former general of the tax police and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and now a representative of the lower house of parliament in the Supreme Court (Brykin was delegated to the State Duma in 2016 on the list of United Russia from the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug, the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug and the Tyumen Region).

The scandals surrounding Brykin are caused by the fact that the Ugra entrepreneur is from the “list Titova» Konstantin Dyulgerov, forced to flee Russia due to pressure from the security forces, openly accused the retired general of organizing a custom-made criminal prosecution. Dyulgerov revealed the details of his misadventures in detail in an actual interview with Novaya Gazeta. The victim in the dubious case of Dyulgerov is Brykin’s son-in-law Sergey Kiryanov, and the hero of the scandal himself, as the editors of Kompromat-Ural found out, before being nominated to the State Duma, transferred multimillion-dollar development assets on the Black Sea coast to his daughter Valentin Kiryanov(in 2016, Breeze LLC, which was transferred to her, had assets worth almost half a billion rubles on its balance sheet!). Brykin ran for deputy as a modest representative of the “patriotic fund” (legally this was a fiction).

The other day, the editorial office of Kompromat-Ural received a response from the Assistant Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation Valeria Volkova(Valery Georgievich came from the leadership of the Prosecutor General’s Office for supervision over the implementation of anti-corruption legislation). We contacted Yuri Chaika on the issue of verifying the accuracy of the declaration information about the personal welfare of Mr. Brykin. Is the people's servant living within his means, who in the shortest possible time after leaving the Ministry of Internal Affairs turned into a dollar millionaire, and then just as quickly got rid of his “deserved” wealth before the elections to the State Duma?

In a recent publication by our colleagues from the Tyumen publication 72.ru, it was noted that according to formal declarations, Nikolai Brykin hangs out at the bottom of the deputy rating: “for 2017, his income amounted to “only” 4.8 million rubles. Less than others, but don’t rush to conclusions. He owns two huge plots of land, a couple of spacious country houses and a modest apartment of 76 square meters. His wife has a larger apartment: 116 square meters. Also registered on it are four residential country houses and two plots of land. And all their family vehicles are registered to Brykin’s wife - a Toyota Land Cruiser, a Shore Land SRV31B trailer and a Sea Ray 185S boat. How the lady managed to buy all this “herself”, earning 2.9 million a year, one can only guess.”

An assistant to Yuri Chaika reported to the editors of Kompromat-Ural that “the powers to conduct appropriate checks in relation to deputies of the State Duma” are vested in the Duma commission for monitoring the reliability of income information, headed by Natalia Poklonskaya(she is also deputy chairman of the Committee on Security and Anti-Corruption). Therefore, according to Valery Volkov’s response, the appeal about Brykin was sent to the lower house. The editors of Kompromat-Ural will monitor the responses of the State Duma Speaker’s office Vyacheslav Volodin and the profile commission. In mid-April, Mrs. Poklonskaya confirmed to reporters that Brykin is indeed one of the five persons involved in anti-corruption checks carried out by the commission she heads. By the way, in this list Brykin is adjacent to the “pubic” deputy from the LDPR, the hero of immoral sex scandals Leonid Slutsky.

Current publications

A scandal with the resignation of a judge erupted in the media Natalia Kalita from the Krasnodar Territory, which authorized the arrest of a bedridden cancer patient, he died soon after being placed in a pre-trial detention center. Of course, Ms. Kalita did not surpass her superior colleague in terms of resonance Elena Khakhaleva, whose biography became a bright grimace for the entire Russian justice system.

Kompromat-Ural editorial correspondents drew attention to an essential detail that did not receive due emphasis in the media. It turns out that over the past 1.5 years this was the second attempt to remove the mantle from the presumptuous judge Kalita. The previous time, they intended to deprive her of her powers for putting pressure on the investigation: the judge personally called the investigator and brazenly, in obscene language, demanded that the criminal case be dropped against the lawyer of her ex-husband, who was suspected of paying a bribe to the magistrate. “Where are you going anyway? There is no composition, I read everything. There is no composition. Where are you going?.. Do you want to imprison him and deprive me of my children? What do you want? Solder him the 291st for 100 thousand?.. Call these idiots at the prosecutor’s office and tell them that there is no case, I’ll call too...” the judge became incensed.

Investigator Roman Birov reported the fact of pressure in the Russian FSB Directorate for the Krasnodar Territory. From there, information “about the unworthy behavior of a judge” was sent to the Qualification Board of Judges of the Krasnodar Territory, where a decision was made to terminate the powers of the judge. But everything was changed by the decision of the Supreme Court; in the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation, the powers of the scandalous judge were returned. Apparently, they were waiting for a second grandiose scandal that would discredit the already tarnished Themis. Or is it a banal belief that everyone will again be submissively and silently tolerated?

According to readers of the Kompromat-Ural portal, the case of Judge Natalya Kalita reflects a general diagnosis of the judicial and law enforcement system, many of whose representatives are, as they say, blown away by permissiveness. Judges in Kuban are, of course, a different story in terms of the scale of abuse. But can any competent expert guarantee that the situation is cleaner in other regions? The day before it became known that the head of the criminal investigation department of the Primorsky Territory (this is not some big colonel Zakharchenko from the top of the Ministry of Internal Affairs) Andrey Milyaeva More than a billion rubles were found in the apartment! In a country with a stagnating economy, with street toilets even in schools (not to mention millions of hut-households), with a humiliating average pension, with a declining number of hospitals, with an increasing cost of living with very modest salaries for the majority of citizens who do not have normal nutrition, - for some reason such news does not cause widespread indignation. Is it worse next?

Do you have any interesting information? Write:compromising- ural@ protonmail. com

The editors of Kompromat-Ural continue to monitor how in Chelyabinsk the scheme of illegal appropriation of rights to an expensive plot of 28 hectares in the Central district of the city remains unpunished. One of the interested parties in the scheme is the former vice-governor Sergey Buynovsky, who tried to gain control of the asset through a “dacha amnesty.” Several temporary trailers were unloaded on the site, which, according to the documents, were registered as real estate, and under this pretext, the Buinovsky family firm - Youth Sports Camp "Movement" LLC - legalized itself through local judges as the owner of the land.

A dubious decision, capable of fabulously enriching a former high-ranking official, was made on December 29, 2016 by a judge of the Central District Court Elena Klimovich(case 2-10088/2016). “Judge Elena Aleksandrovna Klimovich, with one stroke of her pen, de facto took away legally purchased and developed plots of land from citizens and “rewarded” the former vice-governor with a huge plot. The lucky one “grabbed” almost three dozen (!) hectares, justifying his “want” in front of an understanding judge only by the fact that the “buildings” of his “camp” of 10 square meters had allegedly been standing on the ground for a long time. Is this a fair decision?” readers of the Kompromat-Ural portal are indignant with indignation.

After widespread public outcry and the intervention of the Deputy Prosecutor General Yuri Ponomareva a thorough investigation was transferred to the arbitration court of the Chelyabinsk region. As a result, the arbitration decided to release the land plots with cadastral numbers 74:36:0501009:312, 74:36:0000000:45245, on which the “fake” camp buildings were listed, by dismantling and removing them. The decisions were confirmed by all authorities, judicial acts were published in the arbitration file (cases A76-13061/2018, A76-3443/2017) and anyone can study in detail the underside of the “land scam”. In addition, under pressure from the prosecutor's office, a criminal case was finally opened for particularly large-scale fraud (Part 4 of Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). The damage from the planned fraud is estimated at over 492 million rubles!

Judging by the facts, Buinovsky’s “plan” failed because numerous homeowners prevented him. They became the owners of the plots as a result of an open auction in the Chelyabinsk mayor’s office and, having already built and settled in their houses, they learned that Buinovsky LLC MSL “Dvizhenie” was laying claim to their land with its booths, registered retroactively. It was the affected citizens who initiated the arbitration process, criminal investigation and achieved the dismantling and removal of the “Buinovka booths”. But they are still forced to publicly appeal for help from the Chairman of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation Vyacheslav Lebedeva, head of the presidential administration of the Russian Federation Anton Vaino, Prosecutor General Yuri Seagull, Chairman of the Investigative Committee Alexandra Bastrykina(his department refused to accept the investigation against Buinovsky) and the head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Vladimir Kolokoltseva(his subordinates in Chelyabinsk are slowing down the resonant “crime”).

As you know, criminal cases of corruption in Russia reflect only a small part, the tip of the iceberg in the vast array of selfish crimes of those in power. By this logic, analysts at the Kompromat-Ural editorial office are hesitant to assess the scope of abuses in the Federal Bailiff Service. Even the official number of FSSP employees exposed for corruption is so large that it’s scary to even think about the real scale of undetected violations.

At the end of May 2019, the deputy head of the FSSP for the Sverdlovsk region was sent to a pre-trial detention center Elena Sidorova. She is accused of receiving a bribe “through intermediaries” for assistance in facilitating the 2018 enforcement proceedings. According to media reports, the case concerns the bankruptcy of the company of the family of an ex-deputy of the State Duma of the Russian Federation Valeria Yazeva"Jewelers of the Urals". Allegedly, Elena Sidorova was asked to “hold back” the execution of the court decision to recover the company’s property. FSB operatives managed to find her through the chief of bailiffs of the Ordzhonikidze district of Yekaterinburg Nicholas Pozdnyakova, who, according to his testimony, gave the money to the boss.

And the other day another corruption scandal broke out in the Federal Bailiff Service of the neighboring Perm region. As the editors of Kompromat-Ural recall, the current director of the FSSP of Russia, 47 years old Dmitriy Aristov I am originally from this region.

“The Dzerzhinsky District Court of Perm sent the head of the Federal Bailiff Service for the Perm Territory to a pre-trial detention center until September 13 Igor Kozhevnikova. He is accused of receiving a total of 1.15 million rubles. bribes together with ex-subordinate Alexandra Mardanova for the implementation of enforcement proceedings, with the help of which businessmen cashed out funds. During the trial, it turned out that Mr. Kozhevnikov was exposed by his former subordinates Alexandra Mardanova And Yulia Penkevich. Igor Kozhevnikov himself does not admit guilt and insists that he was slandered...

Recently, the ChTPZ group, controlled by a billionaire Andrey Komarov, distributed a press release about the opening of its “daughter” in the United Arab Emirates called Rimera Overseas DMCC. As the Kompromat-Ural editorial columnist clarifies, the new company is 100% owned by JSC Rimera (the so-called oil service division of ChelPipe). The head of the new company was Sergei Mikhailovsky, who before joining Komarov’s Rimera held senior positions at Novomet Group of Companies and TMK GIPI.

At the same time, there was information in the media that the Kremlin could replace the “supervisor” of oligarch Komarov and his assets. According to this version, recently “the director of the Foreign Intelligence Service secretly visited the Sverdlovsk region Sergey Naryshkin. Eyewitnesses claim that they saw him at the Pine Creek Golf Resort near Sysert, the official was playing golf, accompanied by two armed FSO officers.” The visit of such a high-ranking official immediately became surrounded by rumors: it is believed that Naryshkin will become the new “curator” of ChTPZ-PNTZ, replacing in this role the no less respected president of the Russian Golf Association Viktor Khristenko, the husband of a long-lived woman in government offices Tatiana Golikova. Previously, Khristenko’s son led the above-mentioned “Rimera” of Komarov. Nicholas Petrova) - Moscow City Duma. And how excessively cruel and nervous the authorities’ reaction to public protest will be. As the Kompromat-Ural editorial correspondent reports, Saturday’s opposition rally broke the record for the number of detainees and casualties. According to the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for Moscow, 1,074 of the 3,500 rally participants were in paddy wagons. Human rights activists from OVD-info counted 1,373 detainees, including 18 journalists and 42 minors; at least 25 people were injured during arrest and about 150 citizens spent the night in police stations.

The protest leaders were neutralized by force. Head of the Council of Deputies of the Krasnoselsky District of Moscow Ilya Yashina detained and interrogated on the night from Friday to Saturday, and on Saturday morning the director of the Anti-Corruption Foundation was intercepted Ivana Zhdanova, ex-State Duma deputy Dmitry Gudkova, municipal deputy Julia Galyamin and FBK lawyer Love Sable. In the morning, security forces, paddy wagons and buses for detainees appeared on Tverskaya, and the approaches to the mayor's office and the Moscow City Election Commission were blocked. “Law enforcement officers” beat protesters with batons; municipal deputy Alexandra Parushina They smashed her head and she lost consciousness.

Not long before this, a criminal case was quickly “concocted” under the long-dormant Article 141 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (“Obstruction of the exercise of electoral rights or the work of election commissions”). Mass searches were carried out in the apartments of oppositionists, their relatives and friends (this would be a kind of agility - but to fight real crime). Famous lawyer Vadim Klyuvgant stated in the media that the actions of the Investigative Committee against political activists are extremely incomprehensible. In his opinion, the main purpose of initiating a dubious criminal case may be solely to “intimidate” a certain group of candidates not allowed to participate in the Moscow City Duma elections.

At the same time, it became known that the oppositionist was hospitalized Alexey Navalny, who was taken to the hospital with severe swelling of the face and redness of the skin. His supporters believe that the politician could have been poisoned in the special detention center where the founder of the FBK is serving another arrest (he was prudently captured on the eve of the rallies). There is no direct connection with Navalny; his condition can be judged by hospital staff, lawyers and doctors who were able to talk to the patient through the door. Navalny's supporters and journalists who tried to gather near the clinic were also dispersed by police on Sunday evening.

The ruling elite continues to rely on the repressive suppression of protest. How justified is this confidence? “In the event of a multimillion-dollar mobilization, no Russian Guard will save the regime” - under this headline the other day an interview was published with the publicist, winner of the Paul Klebnikov Foundation Prize and the author of the book “Me and My Country: A Common Cause”, Vedomosti columnist Maxima Trudolyubova. A Yekaterinburg journalist talked to him Eugene Senshin. “The country maintains high civic and political activity. Protection of a public garden in Yekaterinburg, the problem of a landfill in the Arkhangelsk region, the illegal arrest of a journalist in Moscow. The new “battlefield” was the elections to the Moscow City Duma. Will all these events lead to a shift in relations between the authorities and society, will the regime, with the help of the Russian Guard, be able to restrain civil mobilization and what should politically active citizens prepare for in the near future...

The public burning of books by famous theologians - Alexander Men, Meyendorff and Schmemann - on the orders of Bishop Nikon was the last straw that overflowed the cup of patience and caused a church revolt. Quiet at first. And today the confrontation in the Yekaterinburg province is called by the clergy themselves and their parishioners nothing more than WAR.

CRIMINAL PRAYER

Going on this business trip, I must admit, I had no idea who was right and who was wrong - the rumors coming from the diocese were too contradictory and incredible. And the fact that the situation was taking on a criminal nature became clear already on the day of arrival in Yekaterinburg - local newspapers reported almost an attempt on the life of Abbot Abraham, one of those who are considered here “the initiators of the uprising against the ruling bishop Nikon - a blasphemer and a homosexual "

From the dossier of Bishop Nikon of Yekaterinburg and Verkhoturye.

In the world - Mironov Oleg Vasilievich. 38 years. Born in the village of Zarechny, Altai Territory. He graduated from accounting school and worked in a workers' cooperative. After the army, he worked as a worker at the Irkutsk diocesan candle workshop. In 1984 he was tonsured a monk with the name Nikon. Five years later he was already an archimandrite and rector of the Intercession Cathedral in Voronezh. Five years later he was appointed bishop of the Yekaterinburg and Verkhoturye diocese. In 1996-1997 he served as a temporary member of the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church. Awarded the Order of Prince Vladimir, III degree, and the medal of the Russian Assembly of Nobility “In Memory of the 850th Anniversary of Moscow”, III degree.

...I'm calling the bishop's chambers. The duty officer, having asked who I was and where I was from, after a long pause, said that there was no bishop.

And who can know where he is?

Only the Lord himself!

Boris Kosinsky, the press secretary of the diocese, reacts without enthusiasm to my request to arrange a meeting with Nikon:

On what issue?

According to the known!

I present an ironclad argument: you need to listen to both sides.

The Bishop prays all the time... Call tomorrow at three o'clock...

I’m calling - day, two, three, four, five... Answering machine: leave your coordinates. They found a fool... I was already warned how this could end.

Meanwhile, the province is seething. Every TV news report begins with the “topic of the day” - a riot on a church ship. They show footage: dozens of believers with anti-Nikon posters stand around the clock in pickets near churches... The police came in large numbers to one of them, as if they were capturing a gang of thugs... The Orthodox of Nizhny Tagil are going to declare their city a “Nikon-free zone.” No one is shy about expressions anymore...

Yuri Fugin, parishioner of the Nizhny Tagil Church of the Life-Giving Source: “I can tell the Lord directly to his face. We, the parishioners, will not let him come even close, we will not allow him to desecrate our temple. There is no place for homosexuals in the Church. Let them go to the North Pole and establish a blue diocese there. For God's sake…"

CHRONICLE OF THE HOLY WAR

As a journalistic investigation showed, the fighting developed like this.

May 1998. At the diocesan council, Nikon is accused of disastrous personnel policies and financial chaos, which consisted in “his wanton robbery of parishes.”

June. The confiscation and burning of books in the courtyard of the Yekaterinburg Theological School, after which, according to one of the priests who refused to take part in this action, student enrollment fell sharply, and “the mark of book burning fell on the school.”

August - November. Evidence was obtained and dozens of witnesses were found that Nikon was not only an atheist, a drunkard, an extortionist, but also a homosexual molester. Five priests, for “ideological” reasons, or rather, because of their reluctance to serve under the “blue” bishop, are leaving the Russian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate for the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia*.

December. Abbots Abraham (Reidman), rector of the monastery In the Name of the All-Merciful Savior in Yekaterinburg, and Tikhon (Zatekin), rector of the St. Nicholas Monastery in Verkhoturye, secretly travel to Moscow to visit the Patriarch. The bishop raises all the provincial police departments to their feet to prevent the meeting. They block roads and search everywhere, even in hospitals. But the fathers still meet with Alexy II and talk about the unseemly actions of the ruling bishop. And when they return, they send a folder with documents confirming these accusations to the Patriarchate. The frightened Vladyka Nikon, just in case, takes out most of his property in an unknown direction.

January 20, 1999. The Synodal Commission of the Moscow Patriarchate, which arrived in Yekaterinburg “for a showdown,” is being settled in the “residence” of Governor Eduard Rossel. On the very first day, its head, Archbishop Sergius of Solnechnogorsk, declares regarding the sin of Sodomy of the ruling bishop: they say, even if so, does this interfere with the management of the diocese? And Father Vladimir Zyazev, one of the most authoritative priests, was even reproached: how come you have so many awards, but you opposed the bishop who awarded you. Father Vladimir immediately took off the awards and placed them on the table in front of the chairman of the commission.

For the information of Archbishop Sergius and the Holy Synod (if they are not in the know). The 25th Apostolic Canon says: if a clergyman has sinned by fornication (even natural, not to mention unnatural), he is deposed and can never again serve or stand before the throne of the Lord. An example from the history of the Russian church: Metropolitan Zosima of Moscow was exposed for the “sin of Sodom,” deprived of his rank and forever expelled from the church. For desecration.

The commission's verdict: the witnesses to Nikon's sins were declared bribed, all accusations were fiction. The conflicting parties called for repentance and reconciliation before the meeting of the Holy Synod. They say that Nikon himself knelt before 120 priests as a sign of repentance.

However, reconciliation did not work out.

February. Governor Rossel, during a meeting with Alexy II, stands up for the Lord. Nikon, returning from Moscow after celebrating the 70th anniversary of His Holiness, declares to the clergy that he has been forgiven.

March. A group of priests goes to the capital again - “for the truth.” This time it is not possible to meet with Alexy II (or not allowed?), but one of his closest assistants allegedly promises to inform the Patriarch. A letter is sent to His Holiness with the most humble request “to remove the cancer of pederasty and cynicism from the body of the church.” One hundred and eight signatures, including fifty-three priests.

April 1st. The meeting of the Holy Synod, having considered the results of the commission’s work, decides: abbots Tikhon and Abraham are to be removed from office, and Archpriest Vladimir Zyazev, rector of the church in Uralmash, is to be “censed for the fact of trampling on church awards.” In total, there are ten priests on the “black list”... Nikon is also punished: he is reprimanded for... omissions in the leadership of the diocese.

“OMISSIONS” OF THE LORD

On what facts are the accusations against the ruling bishop based and why did the members of the Holy Synod not consider them even the slightest serious?

I will quote fragments of original documents (taking into account the above, of course, without indicating names) handed over to me by the competent authorities. Most of it consists of witness testimony. What’s interesting is that they signed in a rather unconventional way. For example: “I am ready to bear an answer for every word at the Judgment of Christ.” Or: “I am ready to swear on the Holy Gospel that what has been said is true”...

“With the blessing of Bishop Nikon, I changed... 2 billion 412 thousand rubles (old), which amounted to 324 thousand 318 US dollars... Their further fate is unknown to me...” “... After open foul language addressed to me, the bishop offered to “donate” him for mitres 5 thousand dollars and then the issue will be settled. Which is what I had to do, shamefully begging for money from the benefactors of our monastery. In addition, monthly 15 million rubles (in old) from two monasteries, Spassky and Novo-Tikhvinsky, I personally transferred to the Bishop...” “I witnessed how literally bags of money were brought into the Bishop’s office... 5-7 sisters counted for several days with morning until evening... Employees of the Church of the Ascension often complained to me that every day people come from the Bishop and take all the money from the cash registers...” “As an Orthodox entrepreneur... I allocated funds both for the needs of the diocese and for the Bishop personally. For example, for golden panagias, trips to Cyprus, etc. To prevent him from dividing the Novo-Tikhvin Monastery, I had to offer a foreign car as a “donation”. He chose a Volvo. Then I had to “donate” another 5 thousand dollars...”

“In the Nizhny Tagil Church of Alexander Nevsky, Nikon took two ancient deacon’s surplices, a set of ancient brocade vestments, an icon in a silver frame... He could put his man in the church cash office and take everything that the temple earned from the sale of candles and ordered prayers with him... From the Nevyansk church requisitioned the cup donated to the temple by Demidov. It was a beautiful bowl, gilded and decorated with stones.” “...I handed over three silver crosses, a chalice, two icons in a silver setting out of obedience to the ruling bishop. The people came to me with questions: where did the icons go, and I had to justify myself to the people...” “In the Holy Trinity Church in Irbit and other parishes, the following were confiscated: a Gospel in a silver setting, silver - a chalice, a star, a plate with the image of the Mother of God , icon of the Mother of God "Fedorovskaya"..."

“...In the Verkhoturye Monastery...Bishop Nikon forbade the hieromonks, hierodeacons and sextons from reading spiritual books, prayers, the Holy Gospel until the day of Holy Easter (which was still six months away), and ordered them to read only the bishop's service..." "Extract from the minutes of the Council of Atamans of the Iset Line Orenburg Cossack Army dated May 29, 1998. With deep regret, the atamans noted Bishop Nikon’s attempts to influence Cossack structures for political and personal purposes. In his speeches there are threats... about excommunicating us from the Orthodox Mother Church in case of disobedience and failure to fulfill his demands... Instead of helping to strengthen the Orthodox faith, under the guise of vigorous activity, the collapse and robbery of the Yekaterinburg diocese is taking place. Bishop Nikon, with his actions, is driving a wedge between the Orthodox Church and the Cossacks... with his boorish attitude he is sowing discord and discontent among the Cossacks. A decision was made: if Bishop Nikon does not change his attitude towards the Cossacks and the Cossacks in general, take measures to prevent him from conducting services in churches on the territory of Cossack villages and farmsteads.”

“...When Vladyka arrived, as soon as he crossed the threshold, he began to behave very violently... because... was drunk. Having learned that one of the diocesan workers had not fulfilled something, he began... to scold him at the top of his voice, using obscene words... Then he loudly demanded: “Get me a governor!” Those around him convinced him not to call the governor in this state. Then the Vladyka began to shout: “Get me an assistant governor!” Everyone was amazed by such actions.” “Over the past two years, Vladyka Nikon came to services at the Verkhoturye Monastery with lay and military officials, where after dinner a drinking session ensued... Several times it happened that Vladyka was not even able to move independently due to severe alcohol intoxication. The drinking became especially frequent when the regional government came... All these “banquets” were accompanied by drinking and singing of worldly songs in the refectory. There was a case... Vladyka presented the Patriarchal award of the Order of St. Blessed. Prince Daniel of Moscow to the Chairman of the Government of the Sverdlovsk Region in the Transfiguration Church of our monastery, after which he proposed to “wash” it according to the old tradition. The Bishop lowered the order with the image of the Saint (!) into a glass of vodka, and he had to take it out of the glass with his teeth.”

“...Our Lord... does not observe any fasts or fasting days at all. Very frequent guests were generals and (a little less often) the adviser for religious affairs to the regional administration V.P. Smirnov. “Receptions” were rarely complete without a bathhouse with alcoholic drinks, from which everyone left in a very drunken state. Smirnov, for example, after dinner had to be led out from the table by the arms, since he himself could no longer walk, Vladyka was in almost the same condition... On the territory of the Church of St. John the Baptist... one of the workers died. In March 1998, a criminal case was opened against Vladyka on this matter, and he was supposed to have a meeting with the prosecutor. And it happened. Afterwards, one of the employees of the prosecutor’s office brought Vladyka home, brought him to the bed, and barely got back into the car... Vladyka was vomiting heavily, he could barely stay on the bed... and we could barely hold him so that he wouldn’t fall face first into the garbage. bucket... In the morning he asked for hangover pills. There weren't any. The Bishop got angry... demanded that they be there by evening... scolded himself, saying that no one needed him here, calling himself a “fool”, “a sodomite” and all sorts of other things. Then I went to serve the Liturgy at the parish...”

“After the evening meal in my cell, where the governor’s representative A.A. Kapustin was present, during tea, the drunk Vladyka suddenly, out of nowhere, slapped the governor’s representative on the head. Alexander Alexandrovich, of course, was indignant... but didn’t show it. In the morning I asked Vladyka if he remembered what he did last night, and he clearly told me: “I slapped Kapustin on the head. It’s okay, he’ll endure it.”

In a word, Nikon’s omissions do occur. But this is not all that the members of the Synod were well aware of...

BLUE HOUSE

I apologize to the readers, but I am forced to quote this document verbatim.

“To His Holiness the Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus' Alexy II from ...

LOWER REPORT

I bring to the attention of Your Holiness that in the first days of October 1996, in the Kazan Church of N. Tagil, Hieromonk P. (Pimen. - Author) I was asked to “APPLEASE” Bishop Nikon of Yekaterinburg and Verkhoturye... I had to fulfill... in bed role of a man. I gave my consent. I was promised “in absentia” his patronage.

...After the evening feast, Bishop Nikon retired to his chambers, and his retinue was sent home. Hieromonk P. came up to me and said that the Bishop was already waiting for me. And so that I don’t feel embarrassed about him.

I went into the chambers, he was sitting at the table, I undressed, and we went to bed. He started trying to kiss me on the lips, but I pushed him away... He asked me to “fuck” him in the anus... I fulfilled his wish...

The next time, while on a business trip to the Diocesan Administration, I stayed overnight... The history of the previous solitude repeated itself... A year later, our solitudes resumed in the Verkhoturye St. Nicholas Monastery... I came and “gratified” his feminine passions. There were three such meetings, after which I began to avoid the Bishop.

The whole time he DEMANDED that I find him someone else. And how he said that he again wanted “to be fucked by two young guys.”

For the fact that I “appeased” the Bishop, Hieromonk P. gave me 5 million rubles. and about 1 million rubles. Bishop Nikon.

That the above is true, I am ready to swear on the Holy Gospel.

03.12.98 (Signature).”

“... I bring to the attention of Your Holiness that as soon as I entered the Yekaterinburg Diocesan Theological School... me and other students... were brought to the dacha of Bishop Nikon, supposedly for work, there they gave us vodka, took us to a bathhouse with a swimming pool, showed videos... When I I went into the steam room, there I saw a completely naked bishop. He took me by the hand, pulled me towards him and kissed me... Then we went to his chambers... He said that he would play the role of a woman and that I would sleep with him. I fulfilled his wish... I didn’t see further events, because I was drunk and fell asleep... The next morning Bishop Nikon was not there...

On the eve of the patronal feast in the Church of the Kazan Icon of the Mother of God in Nizhny Tagil... Hieromonk Pimen came to me at 2 am and said that Vladyka wanted to see me... Vladyka accused me of BETRAYING him and telling someone about our connection . I said I didn't tell anyone about this. Suddenly, turning to the altar... he told me that he swears at the altar that if I tell anyone about our connection with him, even in CONFESSION, then they will put me under a coffin and no one will ever find me..."

“...Vladyka Nikon, when he came to the monastery, constantly had conversations with me on “obscene” topics, in particular, he constantly asked to find him a cell attendant or a boy at the monastery. One time he even demanded (being pretty drunk) that I supply him with boys, citing the fact that in other Dioceses the abbots of monasteries are engaged in supplying boys to the Ruling Bishops... Then he listed the names of the Bishops who are engaged in “unseemly matters.” He talked about how if he had a boy, he wouldn’t be so nervous during Divine services...”

And there are several dozen such evidence. It follows from them that many of Nikon’s inner circle are either lovers (Archimandrite Claudian, Hieromonk Pimen, Priest Vladimir and others) or suppliers of boys. The bishop or his proxies offered money, kamilavkas, positions, rich parishes, and high patronage to everyone they wanted to seduce. Anyone who refused could go to the ends of the world within 24 hours. One priest was exiled to a parish where there was no church...

The “blue case” was staged in such a way that the religious school became a “forge for gays.” A “cunning” admission method was practiced: they gave a special test composed by the editor of the diocesan newspaper, priest Dimitry Baibakov. About two hundred questions like “do you like to look at yourself naked in the mirror and look at your penis.” The answer was given two seconds. This test was used to determine sexual orientation. Naturally, preference was given to those who were more “suitable.” There is no evidence yet that this was done with the blessing of the bishop, but something else is known. One of the students admitted that Vladyka told him after a stormy night: “You didn’t pass the test. And here you correspond!”

But even this was not enough for the Vladyka.

From the already mentioned letter addressed to His Holiness (108 signatures):

“...Archimandrite Claudian said that the Spaso-Preobrazhensky Kamensk-Uralsky Monastery, where he is the rector, will be a special monastery - there the appropriate personnel will be selected for the bishop, that is, homosexuals... I heard about the purpose of the Kamensk-Uralsky Monastery as a den for pederasts from the Bishop himself and abbot Tikhon (Zatekin)..."

CHRONICLE OF THE HOLY WAR-2

April May. By the decision of the Holy Synod, the “rebel” Father Abraham was transferred as confessor to the Yekaterinburg Novo-Tikhvin Convent. Father Tikhon, an honorary citizen of Verkhoturye, is given the dilapidated Assumption Church at the cemetery.

Parishioners respond with protests.

Powerful incriminating evidence against the instigators of the riot is released to the press. They are accused of connections with criminal structures, debauchery, drunkenness, theft, hiding monks in psychiatric hospitals, assault and even murder.

Local television journalist and historian Andrei Sannikov conducts a scrupulous investigation into each of these accusations and in his program “Sannikov’s Land” proves that this is “misinformation” designed for fools: “maybe something will get caught.”

The next stage is blackmail and threats. Unknown people enter the house of Gennady's (Vedernikov) father in Nizhny Tagil. He and Father Thomas (Abel) regularly receive calls: back off.

Governor Rossel, who visited Nizhny Tagil, declares that Nikon is a decent person, that he was slandered by “letter carriers” and that the slanderers have already been punished. The Ural Movement for Gay Rights comes out in support of the bishop...

April 15. Unknown people (as it later turned out, acquaintances of Archimandrite Claudian) contact Abbot Abraham by telephone, and then, supposedly to convey important information, two young foreheads show up at the Novo-Tikhvin Monastery. “Father, you must leave the city. Otherwise…"

25th of April. Believers in Yekaterinburg invite Fathers Thomas and Gennady to a prayer service “for the cleansing of the church.” More than three hundred parishioners gather near the cross on Voznesenskaya Hill - the site of the execution of the royal family. Seven priests pray.

“WILL FIND YOU IN THE PILE!”

...I'm calling Nizhny Tagil. Priest Thomas and Archpriest Gennady immediately agree to the meeting, although it is clear that they have something to fear.

Come!

…O. Thomas, dean of parishes located in places of detention: “The believers already knew everything about Nikon and came to the hill to pray for the purity of the church. And we decided that it was our duty to be with them.”

O. Gennady, rector of the Alexander Nevsky Church, member of the diocesan council: “When we completed the prayer service, I turned to the parishioners with the word: “Do you want you or in the future your children to come to confession to a pederast priest? If not, then faith should be indicated not by declarations, but by deeds. Therefore, we must do everything to prevent Nikon and others like him from bringing our church to destruction from within.”

O. Thomas: “The meaning of Father Gennady’s sermon was that God is betrayed by silence, that if there are blatant cases within the church, then the church must be cleansed of them. During the sermon, many, even men, cried. Then they came up and thanked Father Gennady for his courage.”

O. Gennady: “I was prompted to speak out openly by a specific situation: my spiritual child, whom I was preparing to become a priest, suffered. He was seduced by Nikon. When he saw perverted sex at the bishop's dacha, he was so shocked that he lost his mental balance. The guy then spent a month and a half in a psychiatric hospital. For six months, he and I couldn’t even make normal human contact. Fortunately, in the end he did not turn away from the church, did not leave the faith. I just realized at what frontiers the war is going on in Russia today.”

O. Thomas: “Today we know of three young men who left the religious school because they tried to seduce them. Two more were also subjected to attempted molestation, which, fortunately, was unsuccessful. One was corrupted. This is only from the school... They were taken to the bishop's dacha supposedly for work, and there they tried to get them drunk and showed homosexual porn films. They were driven there by a driver, a homosexual, whose duties included, so to speak, the prelude of corruption...”

O. Gennady: “And he introduced himself as an FSB officer... In general, as soon as we raised the issue of the bishop’s moral character, threats against us immediately began. Both by phone and in person. For example, Father Vladimir Pommer, in the presence of other priests, told Fr. Foma: “Fathers, you go to serve in prisons! It is one thing to serve, and another to sit. You arrive at the prison, and you have drugs...” The bishop repeatedly said in the presence of the venerable meeting of the clergy: “Fathers, which of you can guarantee that he will get home... What if they find someone in the hole!”

O. Thomas: “He also repeatedly said: “Fathers, my panagia will outweigh all your crosses!” That is, he made it clear that he was invulnerable... We are accused of going to complain a second time. But the reason was the biased attitude of the chairman of the commission, Archbishop Sergius... The commission was not going to investigate, it came, firstly, to pacify the riot, and secondly, to intimidate the others! And so when Nikon said that he had been forgiven, naturally, we went again - to seek justice. And “they achieved it.” As a result, the Synod condemned us all and warned that if this ever happens again, more stringent canonical measures will follow... We were forced to go to the press, because there are no longer any internal church methods for solving the problem. The verdict of the Holy Synod, like the verdict of the Supreme Court, is not subject to appeal. But not every verdict can be agreed with... We denounce the sin that makes it impossible to belong to the Orthodox Church. We cannot reconcile ourselves with heresy or sin. Personally, I will go to the end!”

Archpriest Vladislav Petkevich, service experience in the Russian Orthodox Church for twenty-five years, fifteen of them in the Sverdlovsk Cathedral. One of those who, because of Nikon, was forced to leave for the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad:

“The scary thing is not that people learned about Nikon’s sins, but that by his actions he alienated many very honest priests, monks and parishioners. As a result, people may simply lose faith in God. In addition, Nikon gave reason to doubt the purity of the highest echelons of episcopal power on the scale of the entire Russian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate. He gave reason to think that there are a sufficient number of homosexuals among the higher clergy. It is impossible to explain Nikon’s support in Moscow to others.”

GOVERNOR'S RECIPE

…I’m trying to get an appointment with Eduard Rossel. As soon as they find out where they come from and on what issue, there’s a wall. They send... to the press secretary. But we know what the press secretary will say. As soon as the smell of frying began and the press intervened, his boss chose the most convenient position. Its essence has already been voiced by Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Kobernichenko, saying in an interview with the Region-inform agency that these are “internal church matters.” Like, let them figure it out themselves...

Amazing thought! It turns out that the ritual maniac, honored teacher of the RSFSR Anatoly Slivko (seventeen boys strangled and cut into pieces) had to be sorted out by the teachers' council (internal pedagogical matters!), ambulance doctor, rapist and gerontophile Vasily Kulik (fourteen murdered elderly women) - Ministry of Health (internal medical !) and so on. I can imagine what would have happened if they had followed the path of the Holy Synod...

Today the balance of power is as follows. On one side of the barricades is a group of famous and respected priests, hundreds of their parishioners, the intelligentsia, on the other...

Nikon is actively supported by the most influential: the Patriarchy, Governor Rossel and the Movement for the Rights of Homosexuals. Among the local clergy - “test expert” Dimitry (Baibakov), of course, the “common-law husbands” of the bishop, Archimandrite Claudian and Hieromonk Pimen (what kind of bird this is, I learned from one document: “... Living in a hotel room, he drank literally for weeks, urinated on himself Drunk, dirty, smelling of urine, he walked around the diocese and cursed... The Bishop... by the last Easter petitioned His Holiness the Patriarch for the rank of hegumen..."). And part of the clergy, intimidated by the incomprehensible repressions of the Synod and the “book burner” Nikon.

Who will win?

Apparently, the Patriarch has the last word. Or... law enforcement agencies. At least, no one has yet repealed Article 133 of the Russian Criminal Code...

P.S. By order of the Commander-in-Chief of the Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation dated April 18, 1999 “... for active participation in the patriotic and spiritual education of military personnel of the internal troops,” Bishop Nikon of Yekaterinburg and Verkhoturye was awarded the badge of the Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation “For Distinction in Service, First Degree.”

Authors:

The second type of accusation: rumors become overgrown with names, dates, facts. This part will examine incriminating evidence that reached the court:Hieromonk Ambrose (Nosov Nikolai Alekseevich),Bishop of Yekaterinburg and Verkhoturye Nikon (Mironov),Bishop Arkady, Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk and Kamchatka (retired) (Afonin),Archpriest Valentin Sazanov,Metropolitan of Riga and All Latvia ALEXANDER (Kudryashov Alexander Ivanovich).

1. Hieromonk Ambrose (Nosov Nikolai Alekseevich).

In 1997, he was accused of sexually assaulting two 17-year-olds.

Reference.

Hieromonk Ambrose has been director of the male choir since 1956. In 1989 he was ordained by Metropolitan Juvenaly of Krutitsy and Kolomna. He served in the Moscow Church of All Saints on Sokol.

REbuttal.

The story began with the hieromonk's appeal to the court. The teenagers who were sheltered by the hieromonk hit him first with a knife, then with a ceramic mug on the head. From the blow about. Ambrose "scowled, became lethargic and taciturn." While fleeing, the teenagers “took with them the jacket” of the victim. Father Ambrose spent ten days in intensive care (his stomach and liver were affected). After his recovery, he went to court. The teenagers’ lawyers based their defense on the fact that the aggressive behavior of their clients was declared self-defense, and the hieromonk’s leather jacket was “taken by the children” as if by mistake.

Fr. stood up for the priest. Dmitry Smirnov, as well as investigator Alexey Mikhailovich Eliseenko, in particular, he noted that the boys had already been brought to the police. Father Ambrose himself stated that he is not homosexual. The court found no grounds to recognize the teenagers' actions as self-defense. Denis Kovalev, who struck the hieromonk, was found guilty and sentenced to 2.5 years.

2. Bishop of Yekaterinburg and Verkhoturye Nikon (Mironov).

Of all the accusations against Orthodox priests of homosexuality, Bishop Nikon of Yekaterinburg and Verkhoturye suffered the most. The scandal erupted in 1999 during the election campaign for the regional governor. A criminal case was even opened against the bishop. As a result, he was removed from the Yekaterinburg department. However, three points are worth noting right away:

1. After the Yekaterinburg prosecutor's office requested the case, the decision to initiate a criminal case was canceled. The prosecutor's office did not find any grounds to continue the criminal case against the bishop;

2. Contrary to numerous publications in the press that the Moscow Patriarchate does not want to investigate the case and is keeping silent about the incident, the Holy Synod sent two commissions to Yekaterinburg. The commissions found the bishop guilty only of “omissions in the leadership of the diocese”;

3. Finally, the bishop himself did not admit the accusations of sodomy against him, which he stated in his farewell speech to his flock.

Biography of the Bishop.

Bishop Nikon (Oleg Vasilievich Mironov) was born on May 26, 1960 in the village of Zarechny, Smolensk district, Altai Territory, into a peasant family. In 1977 he graduated from high school, then accounting school in the city of Biysk. He worked in his specialty and served in the army from 1978 to 1980. In 1981-1982 he worked in the Irkutsk diocesan candle workshop as a worker. From 1984 to 1987 he studied at the Moscow Theological Seminary, later he graduated from the Moscow Theological Academy, also in the correspondence sector. On December 19, 1984, he was tonsured a monk by Bishop Methodius with the name Nikon. Since June 20, 1989, the rector of the Intercession Cathedral in the city of Voronezh, at the same time he was elevated to the rank of archimandrite. In 1994 he was appointed Bishop of Yekaterinburg and Verkhoturye.

REFUTION

It all started with the so-called. “Letters of the Fifteen,” in which part of the local clergy accused Nikon of inept leadership, rudeness and other worldly sins. There was no talk about homosexuality yet. In January, a commission of the Holy Synod headed by the manager of the affairs of the Moscow Patriarchate, Archbishop Sergius, arrived in the region. The result of her work was the announcement of a “truce” between the bishop and the clergy until the decision of the Synod. However, it did not last long. A new letter appeared - much dirtier and with more signatures. The Bishop and his entourage were accused of sodomy, debauchery and other indecent acts. The letter was distributed at a prayer service on April 25 and signed by 53 clergy and 55 laity of the Yekaterinburg diocese. It is in this letter, addressed to Patriarch Alexy II and members of the Holy Synod, that a number of the most blatant facts of the bishop’s immoral behavior are given.

Then the most interesting thing happened. Unchurched people were primarily waiting for the reaction of the Holy Synod to accusations of sodomy. Even many churchgoers were not interested in the details of the commission’s work. But for the church consciousness (Orthodox hierarchs are people who have taken a vow of obedience), the reaction to the disobedience of part of the clergy was completely natural. The repeated complaint of part of the clergy before the decision of the Synod was a violation of church canon law. As a result, the Holy Synod, at a meeting on March 31 - April 1, 1999, made the following decision:

“HEARD: The report of the Most Reverend Sergius, Metropolitan of Solnechnogorsk, on the results of the work of the Synodal Commission headed by him on January 20-24 of this year in the city of Yekaterinburg to verify the complaints of some clergy of the Yekaterinburg diocese.

DECIDED:

1. Take note of the report.

2. Agree with the commission’s conclusions.

3. Put it on display:

- Abbot Abraham (Reidman) for his unworthy behavior during the work of the Synodal Commission;

- to Archpriest Vladimir Zyazev the fact of public trampling of church awards.
4. Expressing condemnation to Abbot Abraham (Reidman), Abbot Tikhon (Zatekin), Archpriest Vladimir Zyazev, Archpriest Thomas Abel, Archpriest Gennady Vedernikov, Priest Alexander Urakov, Priest Alexy Gorin, who initiated the repeated filing of complaints against their bishop, contrary to promises previously made to the Synodal Commission suspend all actions against the bishop until the meeting of the Holy Synod, relying on the will of His Holiness the Patriarch and the Holy Synod; and qualifying this act as a violation of the word given by these clerics:

- relieve abbot Abraham (Reidman) from his duties as abbot of the monastery in the name of the All-Merciful Savior in the city of Yekaterinburg;
- relieve abbot Tikhon (Zatekin) from his duties as abbot of the St. Nicholas Verkhoturye Monastery.

5. Call on the above-mentioned clergy of the Yekaterinburg diocese and their supporters to repentance and reconciliation with the bishop and warn that persistence in actions leading to a schism in the diocese will entail further canonical punishments against them.

6. To reprimand His Grace Nikon, Bishop of Yekaterinburg and Verkhoturye, for lapses in the leadership of the diocese and for the lack of proper attention to spiritual life in the monasteries of the diocese, which led to the current situation.” .

How was this decision presented in the press? The journalists made the following conclusions: honest people suffered for the truth, and the “blue” bishop got off with a reprimand. However, it is worth repeating that this decision of the Synod concerned only the first letter, which did not contain accusations of homosexuality. According to other sources, out of 85 reports with complaints against Bishop Nikon, 20 were still devoted to sodomy, although they were signed retroactively.

At the request of one of the seminarians, on June 21, criminal case No. 302352 was opened against Oleg Vasilyevich Mironov (aka Bishop Nikon) under Article 133 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation “Force to engage in acts of a sexual nature.” On June 30, Deputy Prosecutor of the Syserstsky District of the Sverdlovsk Region Yu. N. Turygin adopted a resolution to cancel the initiation of this criminal case due to the lack of sufficient grounds.

Comments from journalists were not long in coming. In their opinion, someone “ordered the case to be closed.” As if in this way the authorities and the Patriarchate are trying to hush up the scandal. A similar comment could be read on the pages of the most democratic publications. The journalists, of course, did not have any evidence of direct influence of the Church and authorities on the prosecutor’s office. Legal nihilism never remembers the presumption of innocence.

How was the decision of the Synod received by the believers themselves? Differently. Some people believed that it was all about the elections. Someone decided that it was all about financial fraud. By the way, these versions are not without serious reasons. Details can be found on the Ural Default website in the article “Who “ordered” Bishop Nikon”? Someone continued to write letters to Moscow with a request to rid Yekaterinburg of the “blue” bishop. At the same time, purely criminal “folklore” with various physiological details was actively spreading among the “white” priesthood and monastics.

Bishop Nikon was forced to tender his resignation. At the second meeting of the Holy Synod on July 18-19, 1999, the following decision was made:

"THE DECISION:

1. Having recognized that the mistakes made in the leadership of the diocese by His Eminence Nikon, Bishop of Yekaterinburg and Verkhoturye, led to division among the clergy and laity and caused confusion among believers and the public, retire, stating at the same time that His Eminence Nikon himself, for the sake of church peace , asked to be released from the administration of the diocese.

2. Determine the Holy Dormition Pskovo-Pechersk Monastery as the place of residence of His Grace Nikon.

3. His Eminence of Yekaterinburg and Verkhoturye be Vincent, Archbishop of Abakan and Kyzyl.

4. Entrust the temporary administration of the Abakan diocese to His Grace Anthony, Archbishop of Krasnoyarsk and Yenisei.

5. To complete the study of the circumstances of the conflict that arose in the Yekaterinburg and Verkhoturye diocese and present to the Holy Synod materials on the case of the clergy who participated in it, send a commission consisting of:

a) Archbishop of Kostroma and Galich Alexander.

b) Protopresbyter Matthew Stadnyuk.

c) Archpriest Leonid Roldugin" .

In the Pskov-Pechersky Monastery, Bishop Nikon was blessed to conduct services in one of the churches. Parishioners and clergy of the Ekaterinburg diocese came to him in the Lavra. Since October 2002, Bishop Nikon has served as rector of the Moscow Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Veshnyaki. The parishioners greeted the shepherd with respect. On the day of his namesake, Orthodox Christians came to the bishop from Yekaterinburg and Voronezh, where his path to the bishopric began.

3. Bishop Arkady, Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk and Kamchatka (retired) (Afonin Alexander Petrovich).

He was accused of sexual harassment of a deacon of his diocese. Deacon Roman Staudinger came to Bishop Arkady (Afonin) of Tomsk and Asinsk for a blessing to travel to the Moscow Theological Academy to take the session (1997). In the explanatory note, the deacon will describe this meeting as follows: “Suddenly they began to hug me and demanded that I kiss my bishop on the mouth. Then they grabbed me tightly by the nose, and, pressing me to themselves, stroked my hair, looked at me and kissed me on the forehead. Hieromonk Innokenty and two seminarians were present, as I remember.” The explanatory note was also signed by one of the two seminarians present: “I am ready to testify that the way of communication of Vladyka Arkady confused me. R. b. Daniil Krapchunov." In the second explanatory note, Roman Staudinger will also confirm his words: “Unfortunately, I cannot renounce the words of my first explanatory statement, since I described everything that happened as I remember. And if you need to confirm, then I am ready to stand before the Holy Cross and the Holy Gospel".

Biography of the Bishop.

Born on July 15, 1943 in the village. Chekaline, Sergievsky district, Kuibyshev region. in a peasant family. After graduating from 8-year school, he worked in Kuibyshev at a communications company. In 1964-1968 he studied at the Moscow Theological Seminary. On December 29, 1966, he took monastic vows, on February 15, 1967, he was ordained a hierodeacon, on March 9, 1969, a hieromonk, in 1974 he was elevated to the rank of hegumen, in 1988 to the rank of archimandrite, he served in the Kaluga diocese. On July 17, 2001, according to his own request, he was retired for health reasons.

REFUTION

A number of circumstances do not allow the bishop to be found guilty of this sin.

Firstly, the situation itself is questionable. In the presence of three witnesses, the bishop hugged, demanded to kiss himself on the mouth, grabbed his nose (?), stroked his hair, kissed his forehead. Even if the bishop was confident that he could get away with anything, his behavior still does not seem logical. It was possible to retire;

Secondly, doubts about the authenticity of R. Staudinger’s explanatory note appear after reading the explanatory note of seminarian Daniil Krapchunov: “On December 24, 1997, Priest Alexander (Klassen) asked me to come to his home. He showed me various letters, copies of decrees and explanatory notes related to Your Eminence. After the conversation with Fr. Alexander asked me to sign some of the letters, which I gently refused, since I did not entirely agree with their content. Then Fr. Alexander asked to write a separate note, which I also refused. Then Fr. Alexander asked to make a note under the COPY of the explanatory note of Deacon Roman (Staudinger), since the ORIGINAL, according to Father Alexander, WAS TORN, and it has no force. I was offered several options for the postscript, but I wrote the following text: “I am ready to testify that the manner of communication of Bishop Arkady confused me,” since it reflected the real state of affairs. Now I regret that I made this postscript and, repenting, I ask for your forgiveness. 01/15/98» .

We see how a seminarian was asked to sign some letters, then write a “separate note.” He refuses. In the end, under the deacon’s explanatory note, he agrees to make a postscript, which he regrets;

Third. There are at least two known collective statements by the clergy of the diocese (the clergy of the Tomsk diocese with 40 signatures dated March 11, 1998; the Diocesan Council of the Tomsk diocese with 10 signatures dated May 4, 1998), refuting the “lies and slander” of priest Alexander Klassen and deacon Roman Staudinger. The clerics explain the actions of these clergy by the desire to change the bishop;

Fourthly, Bishop Arkady himself denied his guilt. Deacon Roman Staudinger and Priest Alexander Klassen “for insulting and dirty slander against the Ruling Bishop” were banned from the priesthood.

The Moscow Patriarchate was notified about the conflict, and the case also received publicity in the Tomsk and Novosibirsk media. There were no serious reasons to trust the accusation. Even if the bishop’s immoral behavior is not someone’s invention, but the truth, then there was still no talk of sodomy. Considering that the Orthodox community came out in defense of the bishop, the actions of the Patriarchate become understandable. At the request of His Eminence Sergius, Archbishop of Solnechnogorsk, Administrator of the Affairs of the Moscow Patriarchate, the ban on priests and deacons from serving in the priesthood was lifted (decrees of April 22, 1998). Six months later (from October 6, 1998), the bishop himself was transferred to another diocese. Another year later (from December 29, 1999) he was appointed bishop of the Yuzhno-Sakhalin and Kamchatka diocese, where he began his ministry in 1993.

Another scandal broke out here. As always, it started with rumors of financial fraud. The bishop was accused of trading in free fishing quotas for “currency-intensive seafood.” Quotas, according to media reports, were illegally granted to him by the governor of Sakhalin, Igor Farkhutdinov. This information was disseminated by the deceased deputy of the State Duma (Communist Party of the Russian Federation) Ivan Zhdakaev. However, it is known that the head of the region filed a lawsuit in the Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk City Court. In the lawsuit, he asked to recognize the information disseminated by the deputy in the media as invalid, defaming his dignity and business reputation. The civil case brought by Igor Farkhutdinov was considered in open court. In its decision, the court satisfied the governor's claim. And he ordered Radio Sakhalin to broadcast and the newspaper Region to publish refutations. Moral compensation in the amount of 700 rubles was collected from the journalist who published unverified information. A State Duma deputy paid the governor of Sakhalin 5 thousand rubles.

Meanwhile, accusations rained down on the bishop, one more contradictory than the other. Letters appeared in which the bishop was simultaneously accused of opposite sins: “he caroused with women and seduced men into the sins of Sodom.” The name of the distributor of these letters is known. This is citizen Tatyana Malakhovich, who is suing the Yuzhno-Sakhalin diocese. We can look at this story with a sensational trial in more detail.

By the decision of the parish meeting of the South Sakhalin diocese, former parishioner Tatyana Malakhovich was excommunicated from the Church for heresy and schism. The woman appealed to... civil court. In her opinion, the decision of the meeting violated her rights. In the court of first instance, the decision of the parish meeting was declared illegal: “excommunication cannot be applied, since it violates human and civil rights and does not comply with the Constitution of the Russian Federation.” The higher court overturned the decision, indicating that such a dispute cannot be considered in civil courts at all. The majority of major Russian lawyers share the same opinion. You can read more about this unusual legal dispute in the 5th issue of the magazine "Russian Justice" for 2002. (“T. Malakhovich against the Yuzhno-Sakhalin diocese”, pp.51-53), as well as in LiveJournal.

The scandals that befell the bishop one after another affected his health. The Synod granted the bishop's personal request, and for health reasons he was retired. For us, this judicial precedent is more interesting as an example of some kind of post-dissident behavior. Many of the “runners” or “goers” are eager to find justice for the Church in court. The very fact of excommunication (or defrocking, if it is a priest) by these “truth lovers” is perceived as an encroachment on their CIVIL freedom. Let us recall, for example, Gleb Yakunin, who was first banned from the priesthood and then completely anathematized for unworthily wearing a cross (incident in the State Duma) and lying to the episcopate. As a result, the former priest blamed everything on the Moscow Patriarchate and Patriarch Alexy II personally. They say that these former church KGB agents are pursuing the dissident sufferer in retaliation for all his exposure of their crimes.

5. Archpriest Valentin Sazanov.

In 2003, the archpriest was accused of molesting a young man who was his altar boy in 1993.

Reference. Archpriest Valentin Sazanov, rector of the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral in Nizhny Novgorod, chairman of the Brotherhood in the name of Holy Prince Alexander Nevsky, editor-in-chief of the brotherhood's newspaper "Orthodox Word", under his leadership there were catechism courses, an icon-painting workshop, a large library and a Sunday school.

REbuttal.

The first publications appeared in the newspapers “Orthodox Rus'” and “Russian Vestnik”. In addition to accusations of pedophilia, the archpriest was also accused of his publishing policy: “he hates the holy Tsar Ivan the Terrible, the Sovereign Emperor Nicholas 2 and the elder Grigory Rasputin... From here on his pages, as his favorite regulars, you can see deacon Andrei Kuraev, the “chick” of the Dvorkinsky gateway - O. Mikhail Plotnikov... the shelves of church shops are "decorated" with books by the preacher of Judeo-Christianity and ecumenism Alexander Men...".

In the fall of 2003, one of the parishioners of the Cathedral of St. Alexandra Nevsky filed a statement with the prosecutor's office. In it, she claimed that 10 years (!) ago, Archpriest Valentin Sazanov seduced her twelve-year-old son. But why didn’t the 22-year-old son himself sue?

Thunder won't strike, the woman won't cross herself. It turns out that years later, the son’s condition “deteriorated noticeably: convulsions appeared, speech was impaired - there were symptoms of a serious illness.” She takes him to confession in Optina Pustyn, where he is denied communion due to his manifested homosexual tendencies. Who is guilty? Former father! Mother, Nina Ivanovna, begins to remember the events of 10 years ago. What did she forget?

“... When Nina Ivanovna returned to the apartment without warning, she found the archpriest there in only a negligee, which is why he embarrassedly apologized, saying that it was hot in the room. And then, while cleaning her son’s bed, she was horrified to discover traces of feces, blood and semen on a clean sheet. And how the archpriest again reassured that boys at this age (12 years old - approx. AD) have a tendency to masturbate, but this will pass. She also remembered the mothers who, together with their sons, hastily left the cathedral, not wanting to even talk about it later.”

The question is, how can you forget something like this for ten whole years, and then suddenly remember it? One thing is obvious: the mother’s problem with memory is closely related to the problem of her grown-up son. And maybe the reason for this son’s illness is not in the priest, but in his mother’s upbringing?

After the mother contacted the prosecutor's office, the archpriest was banned from serving by decree of the bishop without the right to wear a cross and priestly vestments until the circumstances of the case were clarified.

A further inspection of the diocesan administration showed that the priest’s accusations of pedophilia were not confirmed. The prosecutor's office of the Kanavinsky district of Nizhny Novgorod also did not find grounds to initiate a criminal case under the article “corruption of minors.” At the beginning of 2006, she completed an investigation into the rector of the cathedral, Alexander Nevsky. Archpriest Valentin Sazanov was found not guilty.

6. Metropolitan of Riga and All Latvia ALEXANDER (Kudryashov Alexander Ivanovich)

All “exposures of the sins” of Metropolitan Alexander are based on the old scenario. In the good Soviet times, the poor and unhappy waiter Alexander Kudryashov was recruited by KGB officer Alexander Ishchenko. It was he who quickly promoted Kudryashov through the ranks of the Church. At the same time, another “special services employee” said that one criminal authority “supplied boys 10-15 years old for pedophilia for Bishop Alexander.” Next comes a detective story with shots, contract killings and chases. The rumor maker who composed this latest fable simply got carried away, because, apparently, he was confident in advance of the success of his creation.

Autobiography of the Metropolitan.

Born on October 3, 1939 in the village of Rudkovo, Preili district, Latvian SSR. In 1964 he graduated from the Faculty of History and Philology of the Daugavpils Pedagogical Institute (Latvia). He worked as a teacher of Russian language and literature at the Kalupe boarding school in the Daugavpils region, the Bikernieki secondary school, and worked for 5 years at secondary school No. 4 in Riga. In 1989 he graduated from MDS in absentia. Awarded the Order of Three Stars, II degree, of the Republic of Latvia.

REbuttal.

The Latvian website KOMPROMAT.LV has long warned that local radicals are preparing a number of provocations directed against the Orthodox Church. One of the last took place on April 23, 2005. At the Riga Intercession Cemetery, the graves of Orthodox nuns were desecrated. Five wooden crosses were broken, ten more were pulled out of the ground and lay nearby the graves. For some reason, a criminal case initiated in 2003 for a similar case was dropped.

The “blue” incriminating evidence against Metropolitan Alexander was born according to all the rules of an anti-church detective story. An ambiguous video was first shown on Latvian television, then testimonies from anonymous “eyewitnesses” appeared in Internet forums. Finally, what was supposed to happen happened. Anonymous messages on the Internet took the form of digestible incriminating evidence. A series of “sensational and revealing” publications were published in various media. Not a word was said about the fact that Metropolitan Alexander received a good education, worked at school, and studied at the Theological Seminary. On the contrary, it was emphasized on his work as a waiter. But soon an interview with that same “KGB officer” Alexander Ishchenko appeared. He directly spoke about the customized nature of the material: “in the part in which they mentioned me, they intentionally or unintentionally got everything wrong.”

Another contradiction in the incriminating evidence was noticed by the journalists themselves. According to Portal-Credo.Ru, “the former Minister of Internal Affairs of Latvia Janis Adamson, being the head of the special investigative commission of the Seimas, was involved in the investigation of the “pedophilia case” for a long time. He managed to establish that a whole galaxy of high-ranking officials of the Latvian state were clients of two companies that supplied boys.” However, according to other media reports, Adamson ceased to be a minister in 1995, and the pedophilia scandal broke only in 1999.

We see how unrelated facts and rumors are combined by someone into one simple plot and presented as revealing truth.

The Catholic Cardinal Janis Pujats somehow became involved in this whole story. Allegedly, on Latvian television, regarding Metropolitan Alexander, he said: “In the world such a leader would have been imprisoned long ago, but in the Church such a person should have been dismissed.” Perhaps the information is still not accurate. After all, then the cardinal himself will be involved in this scandal. It was he who, after the scandal, took part in various joint actions with Metropolitan Alexander in support of the institution of the family:

“The leaders of Christian denominations in Latvia signed a manifesto on May 31, in which they called on society to take care of preserving the institution of family in the country. The document was signed by... Cardinal Janis Pujats, Metropolitan of Riga and All Latvia Alexander (Kudryashov)..." ;

“Several thousand people took part in the large march in defense of the family, which passed through the streets of Old Riga... At the beginning of the column were the heads of the Lutheran, Catholic, Orthodox, Baptist, and Adventist churches.” .

Moreover, Cardinal Janis Pujats found it possible to attend the Divine Liturgy in the Cathedral of the Nativity of Christ in the city of Riga, where Metropolitan Alexander (Kudryashov) of Riga and All Latvia concelebrated with His Holiness Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus' Alexy II.

The statements of Cardinal Janis Pujats cannot but surprise, because... The presumption of innocence has not yet been canceled. Or was this whole scandal deliberately simulated in the Vatican?

In a conversation with journalists, Metropolitan of Riga and All Latvia Alexander (Kudryashov) commented on the position of the Latvian Orthodox Church in relation to sodomites: “We also condemned the legalization of same-sex marriage, due to which they were not recognized by the state legislation of Latvia, although such attempts were made more than once. Our statement noted that same-sex marriage is an unnatural phenomenon, it is a violation of all moral norms and will bring God’s curse on the people. The discussion was fierce; one Lutheran priest, a doctor of theology, although he came from the West, very actively advocated same-sex marriage. The Lutheran Church of Latvia deprived him of his rank for this. By the way, the Lutherans were immediately reproached for the lack of democracy and the violation of human rights.
We need to understand that the voice of one confession will not be so significant, so we must and can only speak together. We protested together against the propaganda of sex education, which is being imposed on Latvian schoolchildren. As Orthodox Christians, we try, as an alternative, to propagate the principles laid down in the Social Concept of the Russian Orthodox Church, adopted at the Jubilee Council of Bishops in 2000.” Metropolitan Alexander answered all the “revelations” addressed to him very briefly: “...So why should we notice their vile, lying insinuations? Dirt will not stick to something pure, and everyone who says a word will have to give a severe answer for it at God’s Judgment...”

The press secretary of the Latvian Orthodox Church (LPC), Oksana Dementieva, confirmed the Church’s intention to sue the Internet portal “Kompromat.lv,” which disseminated information about the possible involvement of the head of the LOC, Metropolitan Alexander (Kudryashov), in the pedophilia scandal.

https://www.site/2013-05-30/figurant_cerkovnogo_gey_skandala_ekaterinburgskiy_vladyka_nikon_stal_vikariem_v_permskoy_eparhii_pod

The figure involved in the church gay scandal, Bishop Nikon of Yekaterinburg, became a vicar in the Perm diocese under the leadership of his teacher Methodius. Andrey Kuraev: “Our Synod suddenly makes such a super-tolerant gesture...”

The former head of the Yekaterinburg diocese Nikon (Mironov), who was notable for a loud gay scandal in the late 90s, became the vicar of the Perm diocese with the title “Dobryansky”. The corresponding decision, as stated on the website of the Moscow Patriarchate, was made at a meeting of the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church.

As Deacon Andrey Kuraev noted in his blog, Nikon was exalted in Voronezh when Metropolitan Methodius was there. “Now Metropolitan Methodius is in Perm, and his student and assistant is returning to him,” Kuraev noted.

He also writes in his blog that over the past 20 years, four bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church have been accused of deviant sexual behavior.

“That is, in these cases the case did not reach the courts, either ecclesiastical or secular, but the names of them and their accusers were actively rinsed in the big press, including the international one. Because there was no public and independent investigation into these accusations, and I cannot say whether there was or not. But there is such a thing as reputation. Good or bad testimony. Moreover, both “external” and “internal”. And in these four cases the worst reputation stuck. All four were removed from their pulpits during the previous patriarchate. After the departure of Patriarch Alexy, two of them were returned to full-time episcopal service. First, Savva (formerly Zvenigorodsky) received the department and was appointed to Tiraspol. Then Gury (formerly Parisian) was assigned to Kazakhstan. Today the Synod restored the third - former Bishop Nikon of Yekaterinburg - assigning him to the Perm region. […] When in France the people protest against homo-Dollandization, when in Russia a rather unexpected consensus emerged even among the power elites against the growth of homosexual claims, our Synod suddenly makes such a super-tolerant gesture. Of course, no preliminary or accompanying explanations are given. People are left with their established and unrefuted opinion about these bishops and with the facts of their lack of jurisdiction and their next elevation,” notes Kuraev.

Nikon served in the Yekaterinburg diocese from 1994 to 1999. He was expelled by decision of Alexy II after a series of letters signed by the local clergy about the indecent behavior of their spiritual leader, allegedly inducing young novices to cohabitate. Nikon Mironov was sent for correction to the Pskov-Pechersky Monastery. In addition, a case was opened against him under Article 133 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (“Forcing sodomy using the financial or other dependence of the victim”), which was then closed.