12 ARMENIAN COMMUNITIES OF RUSSIA LEVEL COMPLAINTS AGAINST CATHOLICOS KAREKIN II’S BROTHER AND ARCH. HOVNAN DERDERIAN’S COLLABORATOR, ARCH. YEZRAS OF RUSSIA
Posted on July. 26. 2019
BY T. BAGRAMYAN
Moscow, russia
Source: https://t.me/bagramyan26/8679
Translated from Eastern Armenian by Appo Jabarian
On July 21, RA Prime Minister’s High Commissioner for Diaspora Affairs Zareh Sinanyan paid an official visit to the Diocesan complex of the Armenian Apostolic Church in Moscow. He attempted to meet with Archbishop Yezras Nersisyan, Primate of Russia and New Nakhichevan of the Armenian Apostolic Church, who has established himself in contemporary Armenian history as a “Forcible Usurper of Armenian community churches in Russia.”
Obviously, Archbishop Yezras was not too enthused to personally host Sinanyan.
Sinanyan had planned to relay to Arch. Yezras the complaints leveled against him by a dozen of Armenian communities in Russia in connection with the activities and misbehavior of the primate and his representatives. Representatives of the Union of Armenians of Russia had shared with Sinanyan a set of issues involving Arch. Yezras.
On the first day of the visit, Sinanian met with the Union of Armenians of Russia, where, to the surprise of many people, sharp criticism was directed against Catholicos Karekin II’s blood-brother and Arch. Hovnan Derderian’s collaborator, Arch. Yezras of Moscow.
During the meeting, several Armenian citizens of Sarov, Russia immediately raised a very sensitive issue that we had initially decided not to write about at the request of the President of the Union of Armenians of Russia, Ara Abrahamyan, who urged the participants of the discussion to not publish this information. But then we received information that Mr. Abrahamyan knew about this problem but wanted to solve it by using Sinanyan. Although Abrahamyan tried to use his creative talent to feign lack of knowledge about the issue and that it was the first time that he was learning about it, but it turned out that he was keenly aware of the situation.
In the course of the discussion, Sarov’s Armenian citizens openly accused Arch. Yezras and his clergy of turning the Armenian Church into a private business enterprise. According to Mnatsakan Arakelyan, the head of the Armenian community of Udmurtia, 5300 Armenians of Udmurtia had appealed Arch. Yezras to consecrate the church built in 2012. But Yezras tried to impose three conditions:
- Provide his clergy with a stable salary;
- Hand over the deeds of the church property and related building structures and vacant lands of the parish to him. (Editor – Peculiar similarities exist between Arch. Yezras’s misdeeds in Udmurtia, Russia and Arch. Derderian’s 2016 wrongdoings at St. John Garabed Church in San Diego, CA USA); and
- Transfer 1,200 000 rubles, to the so-called “stabilization fund” — meaning outright bribe.
“I urged Yezras to withdraw these three conditions. It is not the people that should serve the clergy, but it’s the clergy that must serve the people. There are similar problems not only in our community, but also in the Sverdlovsk region along with Penza, and Yekaterinburg. All in all, 12 cities,” said Mr. Arakelyan, who could barely control his feelings of indignation.
The Armenian inhabitants of Sarov also mentioned that they had tried to solve this problem on their own, but they failed. And “now they have to ask Sinanyan” to help them “solve this problem.”
Sinanyan was shocked. Nevertheless, he answered saying that the church and the state are separate structures and that he cannot interfere. However, he promised to convey their disaffection from Arch. Yezras to the primate during his Sunday morning meeting with him.
But Yezras declined to meet with Sinanyan yet again. Apparently, he may have been at unease as a result of his own misdeeds.