Subject: 1996.03.06 OMRI Daily

No. 47, Part II, 06 March 1996


ESTONIAN PREMIER ON ORTHODOX CHURCH DISPUTE. Tiit Vahi said on 5 March
that the Estonian government has tried not to get involved in religious
problems and thus only dealt with the secular side of the dispute within
the Orthodox Church, ETA reported. The state was obliged to return to
the Estonian Apostolic Orthodox Church the property it had prior to
World War II. He said he was glad that the EAOC had agreed to allow
Moscow-led congregations to use their church buildings. Interior
Minister Mart Rask called recent Russian charges that his ministry was
creating a schism in the Orthodox Church unfounded. He could not comply
with the demands to abolish the registration of the EAOC since courts
had ruled that its registration was in accordance with Estonian laws. --
Saulius Girnius