The case against Denis Popovich and Nikita Ivankovich, whom investigators accuse of involvement in a plot against Metropolitan Tikhon (Shevkunov), has taken a new turn. In the summer, both men told the court they had been tortured in pretrial detention with electric shocks and beatings, and they withdrew their confessions. A new hearing on extending their detention is scheduled in Moscow for December 9.
According to people close to Ivankovich, he has been held in Lefortovo since April; he was recently allowed to visit the prison chapel for the first time, where he was able to confess and receive communion. The defense has secured only limited procedural progress: wording about the reasonableness of suspicion was removed from the detention ruling, and the court acknowledged that no fingerprints of the accused were found on explosives discovered in Moscow’s Terletsky Park. Their custody status remained unchanged.
On November 12, the FSB’s public relations center announced new detentions in the same case. State media portrayed the detainees as people recruited by Ukrainian intelligence services. According to the publication, however, all those detained in early November were released after searches and questioning and remain witnesses. People identified in the footage reportedly included Sretensky Theological Academy lecturer Georgy Bitbunov and individuals linked to the Pskov-Pechory Monastery.
The article says the case was also preceded by posts in pro-government Telegram channels alleging a “Ukrainian lobby” around Tikhon. The metropolitan himself has not publicly commented on the arrest of his former novices for ten months, although on November 4, 2025 he again appeared with Vladimir Putin at a public event tied to the Orthodox Rus exhibition.
Against that backdrop, the report describes other cases of pressure on religious figures. On November 27, hieromonk Iona (Sigida), assistant to 88-year-old Archbishop Viktor (Pivovarov) of the independent RosPTs, was detained in Slavyansk-on-Kuban. After a search at the church, he was placed in custody; parishioners say officers used a stun gun on him. Investigators accuse him under legislation on the rehabilitation of Nazism, citing anti-war publications and criticism of the cult of war.
In addition, on October 17, hieromonk Nikandr (Pinchuk) of ROCOR was arrested in Verkhoturye on charges of justifying terrorism, while proceedings continue in Rostov Region against anti-war Christian Bogdan Yakimenko. In Novaya Gazeta Europe’s assessment, alongside earlier methods of persecuting clergy for anti-war views, accusations tied to “Ukrainian roots” or sympathy for Ukraine are increasingly being added.