Podgorica, (MINA) – The allegations by representatives of the Serbian Orthodox Church (SPC) that the Government has kept secret from the citizens the Venice Commission’s supposed opinion on the Draft Law on Freedom of Religion is absolutely not true, the government has stated.
“The impudence and evident malevolence with which this false accusation has been publicly releases offer yet another proof of the length to which certain SPC officials are ready to go in order to retain the illegitimate privileges and revenues from the usurped state property in Montenegro,” the Government said in a press statement.
To the series of double dealings, unbecoming to representatives of any religious community, the SPC added, the Government argues, ‘this parapolitical intrigue’.
“The truth is that not only that the Venice Commission’s opinion has not been presented to the Government, it has never even been prepared. The fabricated document referred to by certain representatives of the SPC is therefore a plain falsification,” the Government stated.
The press statement adds that, regardless of what they called a dirty campaign launched by SPC Patriarch Iriney when he compared Montenegro to the fascist puppet state of NDH, they will persist in the efforts to protect state interests, while fully respecting the freedom of religion and equality of all religious communities in the civic state of Montenegro.
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