Nine Wounded in Explosion in Ukraine Church

Kiev, July 29, Interfax

Police at the scene of the explosion. Photo by Olesya Markovetz, Zaporozhe Reporter. Police at the scene of the explosion. Photo by Olesya Markovetz, Zaporozhe Reporter.
Nine people have been injured in a blast outside the Protection Cathedral of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate in Zaporоzhyе, Ukraine on Wednesday, the regional police told Interfax.

At 4:39 p.m. local time, police received a report from a duty officer of the Emergency Situations Ministry division that an explosion had occurred in the cathedral standing near a marketplace.

Operatives, investigators and representatives of the prosecutor's office were alerted to the scene.

"Nine people were injured in the blast. They were rushed to hospital," a police spokesman said.

Sr. Liudmila, a nun who worked in the church, died of her injuries on the operating table on Thursday, July 29. Sr. Liudmila was eighty years old.

The spokesman said that the blast did not cause any damage to the cathedral despite local media reports saying windows were broken.

Police have said that the blast at an Orthodox church on Wednesday in southern Ukraine that killed one and injured nine could have been an act of terrorism.

"We are considering all the possible motives starting with domestic - settling scores - and ending with the possibility of a terrorist act aimed at intimidating the parishioners of the Cathedral of Intercession," Ukrainian Interior Ministry spokesman Dmitry Andreуev told journalists.

He added that it had been established that the blast, which took place near the entrance of the church, was caused by an improvised explosive device.

Orthodox Christians mark July 28 as the Day of the Baptism of Rus.

Compiled from Interfax - Religion

7/30/2010

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