Russian TV: The head of the Russian Orthodox Church claims that the church is under an information attack, after several scandals broke out in less than a month.

Patriarch Kirill made the statement at Tuesday’s session of the newly-founded Supreme Church Council. He claimed that the“powerful anti-church rhetoric” coincided with “three terrible desecrations of churches”, and that he himself was subjected to information attacks.

The “desecrations” mentioned include an improvised concert by girl punk band Pussy Riot in Moscow’s major Cathedral of Christ the Savior. Police detained some of the group’s members, charging them with organized hooliganism, a criminal offence in Russia. Some church officials asked the state to give the young women the harshest possible sentence, but top religious leaders denounced the entire event as an attempt to sow discord between believers and non-believers.

Another part of the alleged campaign was the spreading of information about the Patriarch’s lawsuit against his neighbors in a historical apartment bloc near the Kremlin. Kirill seeks 20 million rubles (about $700 thousand) in damages, claiming that renovation work carried out by the family of former health minister Yuri Shevchenko caused clouds of grit to get into his apartment, damaging valuable books. The report was initially spread by lesser-known websites, but was later confirmed by Kirill himself in interviews with major media.

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