Ukrainian Church leader likens Putin to Cain and says he is under the influence of Satan

The head of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church Kiev Patriarchate has implied that Russian President Vladimir Putin is governed by Satan and is a modern-day incarnation of Cain who has doomed himself to “eternal damnation in hell”.

The Patriarch Filaret – his secular name is Mykhailo Denysenko – is the leader of the Kiev Patriarchate, which has a rival in the Moscow/Ukrainian Orthodox Church after splitting from it in 1992.

President Putin, a baptised Orthodox Christian, has close links to Russia’s Orthodox Church, Reuters reports.

In a 1,300-word online blog post, Filaret fails to mention Mr Putin by name but alludes to him in strong words that describe his target as a world leader, who through baptism belongs to the Orthodox Church, but is now “under the action of Satan”.

He says that among the world leaders has “appeared a real new Cain”, referring to the Biblical story in which the aforementioned kills his brother Abel.

Filaret says that this leader acquired “power not on good deeds, but on evil” and that through propaganda, has spread “cynical lie about Ukraine, sow enmity against the Ukrainian people, and against our desire to be independent and build our own sovereign state, they provoke bloodshed and murder in the Donbass [the region marred by separatist-government fighting in eastern Ukraine].”

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“He says outright and blatant lies: organizing and sending killers mercenaries to our country, speaks of ‘internal conflict’, to which he allegedly is not involved; sending to Ukraine his troops, he publicly states that these forces are not present there.” the post, written in English, Ukrainian and Russian, states.

“This ruler is cynically lying, saying that his country is not a party to the conflict in Ukraine - although he did everything in order to foment the conflict and maintain it.”

President Putin has constantly denied any Russian involvement in the movements or funding of pro-Moscow separatists in the Ukrainian conflict, rejecting claims that he has provided them with weaponry or troops.

Filaret then mocks Mr Putin for supposedly believing himself to be Ukraine’s “brother”, and then lays the blame for the hundreds of deaths and those displaced from the conflict squarely at the feet of the “abovementioned governor” who has his “pride” to blame.

“He calls himself a brother to the Ukrainian people, but in fact according to his deeds, he really became the new Cain, shedding the brotherly blood and entangling the whole world with lies,” Filaret says.

He implies that Mr Putin’s power is no match to that of God’s and called on the Russian leader to repent and “come to your senses!”

“Calls for this ruler and his minions have already been sounded many times publicly - to think again, to stop sowing evil and death, to repent.

“But it seems that he remains deaf to these appeals and only multiplies evil, because Satan went into him, as into Judas Iscariot.”

Patriarch Filaret met with US Secretary of State John Kerry in March this year, when the statesman travelled to the eastern European country to honour those fallen and give support to the government.