After the matter of forced conversion had become extremely controversial, the NDH government on 3 April 1942 adopted a law that established the Croatian Eastern Orthodox Church. This was done in order to replace the institutions of the Serbian Orthodox Church. According to the "Statute concerning the Croatian Eastern Orthodox Church" that was approved on 5 June, the Church was "indivisible in its unity and autocephalous". In June, White Russian émigré Germogen Maximov, an archbishop of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, was enthroned as its primate. The establishment of the Church was done in order to try and pacify the state as well as to Croatisize the remaining Serb population once the Ustaše realized that the complete eradication of Serbs in the NDH was unattainable. Persecution of Serbs continued however, but was less intense.
