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Tycoons to help repossess Russian church buildings in
Jerusalem
"The head of Russia's Audit Chamber said on Monday that
two billionaires had agreed to help repossess Orthodox church buildings in
Jerusalem that Israel bought from Soviet authorities 40 years ago.
The two buildings - St. Sergius' church and the
Ecclesiastical Mission - are part of Jerusalem's so-called Russian Compound.
The churches were built in the final decades of Tsarist rule and partially sold
to Israel by the Nikita Khrushchev's government in 1964. Israel paid for the
assets with a shipment of citrus fruit in what went down in history as the
"orange deal".
Chief Auditor Sergei Stepashin, who is also head of the
Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society, said businessman Roman Abramovich,
governor of the Chukotka Region and owner of London's Chelsea FC, and
Russian-born billionaire Arkady Gaidamak who lives in Israel, had accepted the
Russian government's request that they cover expenses for moving institutions
currently accommodated in the buildings to other premises.
St. Sergius' church is currently occupied by Israel's
Ministry of Agriculture and government agencies for environmental protection,
while the Ecclesiastical Mission houses the Jerusalem Magistrate's Court.
Stepashin said the handover of the property was likely
to be legally fixed next year. He said his hopes were based on "agreements
reached with the Israeli side on the highest political level" and Russia's
guarantees. "There are people who are ready to help those occupying the
buildings leave them," Stepashin told a Russian diaspora meeting in
Israel.
The Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society was established
by Emperor Alexander III in 1882 to facilitate Orthodox Christian pilgrimages
to the Holy Land and to promote Palestinian studies and humanitarian
cooperation with the peoples of the biblical region.
In the Soviet era, the society was restructured as part
of the National Academy of Sciences. With religious activity in the country
largely suppressed during those years, it could no longer arrange pilgrimages
to the Holy Land, and focused entirely on Palestine-related research, holding
regular symposiums and publishing an almanac."
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