Nuncio condemns ‘criminal oligarchy’

A senior Vatican official has warned that Ukraine will need “far-reaching reform” regardless of the “Russian aggression” it faces, writes Jonathan Luxmoore.

“Ukraine is just now playing catch-up in addressing the repair or removal of servitude structures from its Soviet Communist past, which other countries in Central and Eastern Europe were able to address and at least begin to change almost immediately after the fall of the Berlin Wall,” said Archbishop Thomas Gullickson, the Holy See’s nuncio in Kiev. “Much of the current destabilisation is attributable to the depredation carried out and still continuing at the hands of Ukraine’s own criminal oligarchy, exacerbated by Russian aggression against its territorial integrity.”

In an address to the Catholic charity, Aid to the Church in Need, the US-born nuncio said Ukraine’s Greek Catholic Church was at risk if Russia seizes power “but if Russian aggression ended ­tomorrow ...  Ukraine would still face enormous challenges in ­rooting out corruption and establishing a just society”, he added.