Patriarch Kirill has managed, with Viktor Orbán’s help, to avoid EU sanctions – but now may not be able to for much longer
Joe Barnes and Antonia Langford
30 April 2026
The Telegraph
Patriarch Kirill, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, has been a thorn in the side of Ukraine – and Europe – for more than a decade. He famously nicknamed Vladimir Putin’s rule a “miracle of God” in 2012 and characterised the full-scale invasion of Ukraine as a “Holy War”. He is, the EU says, “one of the most prominent supporters of the Russian military aggression against Ukraine”. And yet the bloc has been unable to sanction him.
Some 14 separate attempts by Brussels to include the religious figurehead on sanctions lists were blocked by the Hungarian government over concerns for “religious freedoms”. But now, Kyiv believes the ousting of Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s outgoing prime minister, presents a fresh opportunity to hit the 79-year-old with punitive measures over his support for the war.
Vladyslav Vlasiuk, the Ukrainian commissioner for sanctions policy, told The Telegraph: “This is one of the issues I’m going to flesh out – the oligarchs and patriarchs who have been missing on the list for a while because of powerful advocates, governmental ones. “This is something I think should be reconsidered.” Mr Vlasiuk will make the case for listings to be reviewed in future sanctions packages drawn up by the European Commission in talks with Brussels.
Kirill is a former KGB agent and a long-running champion of Putin, having thrown his weight behind most of the Russian president’s policies, most notably his invasion of Ukraine. He has described dissenters as “traitors to the motherland”.
While Putin calls it a “special military operation”, Kirill has called the fight a “Holy War”, and expelled or suspended priests who opposed the conflict or continued to associate with Russian opposition figures.
Kirill’s position on the Ukraine war saw him described as “Putin’s altar boy” by the late Pope Francis in 2022. At the onset of the full-scale invasion, he revived military clergy structures that had been retired more than a century before, and appointed a head military priest to oversee church activities for the Russian forces at war in Ukraine.
In November 2025, he told the World Russian People’s Council, an international forum, that Russian soldiers fighting in Ukraine were not violating the Bible’s sixth commandment: “Thou shalt not kill.” “The church allows its faithful to take part in military operations if this is dictated by the necessity of protecting one’s neighbours and restoring justice,” he claimed. “When evil takes people’s lives, when the enemy threatens the lives of the elderly and children, of women and the young, then inaction becomes unjustifiable. In such cases, non-resistance to evil amounts to complicity in murder.”
Kirill’s Russian Orthodox church has long been accused of parroting Russian propaganda and spying for the Kremlin.
In Norway, the Søreide prayer house, which overlooks the Haakonsvern naval base in Bergen, was bought by a Russian Orthodox congregation in 2017. Officials warned at the time that Moscow could use its position to disrupt signals, control drones and map the area.
In the Swedish city of Västerås, a church, patrolled by attack dogs and surrounded by fencing and cameras, was built close to a strategically important airport in 2023, and later assessed by Swedish intelligence as a potential platform for espionage. The priest overseeing the church received a medal from the SVR, Russia’s main civilian foreign intelligence service, officials said.
It was because of Kirill’s support for the war that European Commission officials proposed including him on a blacklist of Putin’s cheerleaders, as part of the EU’s sixth package of sanctions on Moscow in spring 2022.
Hungary exercised a unilateral veto over the sanctions package until the religious figure’s name was removed. That prohibition was maintained for 14 additional rounds of sanctions before Brussels dropped plans to include him on the list, which now spans more than 2,000 names.
Kirill appears on the sanctions lists of no fewer than seven countries, including the UK, Canada, Ukraine, Australia and a number of EU member states that moved unilaterally against him.
Now that Mr Orbán, who ruled for 16 years, has been defeated in a landslide election, there is optimism in Brussels that it can pursue policies in support of Ukraine without Hungary wielding a veto. He was considered the bloc’s most pro-Kremlin leader and used attacks on Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, as part of his failed campaign for re-election.
Audio recordings of calls between Péter Szijjártó, his foreign minister, and Sergey Lavrov, his Russian counterpart, fuelled further concerns about relations between Budapest and Moscow.
During their calls, Mr Szijjártó agreed to help undo sanctions against Russian oligarchs and their families and send secretive EU documents to the Kremlin. Since Mr Orbán’s defeat, there have been signs that suggest the EU will once again be able to drive through its pro-Kyiv agenda. Last week, Hungary finally dropped its veto over a proposed €90bn (£78bn) loan to the war-torn country to help it buy weapons and prop up its economy.
Mr Orbán refused to sign off on the required legislation because of a separate row involving halted supplies of Russian oil to Central Europe via Ukraine.
Kyiv eventually relented to his demands to repair the damaged Druzhba pipeline, as requested by the European Commission, to help unblock the much-needed funds.
On Wednesday, Mr Vlasiuk, who is a member of Mr Zelensky’s inner circle, also said the UK should “catch up” with France and detain sanctioned Russian tankers. Although Sir Keir Starmer said he would “go after” Putin’s shadow fleet, not one ship has been captured by the UK.
Joe Barnes is a Brussels Correspondent for The Telegraph, covering a wide range of topics including politics, international relations, and current affairs. With a strong focus on European affairs, Joe’s reporting provides insights into the complexities of the region and its implications for global events. His work has been featured in various publications, showcasing his expertise and extensive coverage of significant geopolitical developments.
Antonia Langford is a Freelance Journalist, based in Kyiv. She writes for The Telegraph, The Guardian, and The Times, among others. She is also the Evening News Manager at The Kyiv Post. She covers Ukraine and Russia. Antonia was shortlisted for Best Early Career Journalist in the Freelance Journalist Awards 2025.