The Russian Orthodox Church is again trying to return the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kyiv Patriarchate to the Moscow Patriarchate, Filaret (Denysenko), the head of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kyiv Patriarchate, said.

"They now want to call us again to negotiations on the return to the Moscow Patriarchate. I want to say [...] in the first place to the Moscow patriarch and the Russian bishops: the Ukrainian church will never go back to the Moscow Patriarchate. Why will it not go back? Because we have our own state," the head of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kyiv Patriarchate told a press conference in Kyiv on Friday.

"You see how Moscow is deceiving? One cannot trust them [...] In terms of the church, either. There was a request for an address to achieve reconciliation, that is, prayer unity, but they are again trying to make us go back [to the Moscow Patriarchate]," he said.

At the same time, Patriarch Filaret believes churches can have dialogue on the recognition of the autocephaly of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kyiv Patriarchate, not on the Kyiv Patriarchate going under the control of the Moscow Patriarchate.