Religious persecution and issues – Bimonthly Digest December 01-15
13.12.2024 – An appeal in Irkutsk upheld the verdict for nine Jehovah’s Witnesses
JW – On December 12, 2024, the Irkutsk Regional Court upheld the sentence of nine Jehovah’s Witnesses. Earlier, the court of first instance had sentenced them to various terms of imprisonment in a penal colony. The believers continue to insist on their innocence and have the right to appeal the verdict in cassation.
As noted by the defense, the services in which the convicted Jehovah’s Witnesses participated had nothing to do with the liquidated legal entities. Nevertheless, Sergey Vasiliyev was found guilty of participation in the activities of an extremist organization (part 2 of article 282.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), the rest of them were found guilty of organizing the activities of an extremist organization (part 1 of article 282.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), and six of them were also found guilty of financing it (part 1 of article 282.3 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation).
13.12.2024 – In Biysk, a Jehovah’s Witness was sentenced to suspended imprisonment
JW – On December 11, 2024, the Bija City Court sentenced Jehovah’s Witness Sergei Lukin to four and a half years of suspended imprisonment and one and a half years of restriction of liberty. The believer was found guilty by ch. 1.1 and 2 Art. 282.2 of the Criminal Code (involvement of others in an organization recognized as extremist and participation in such an organization).
On December 5, 2024, during the debate, the prosecutor asked the court to sentence Jehovah’s Witness Sergei Lukin to five years of forced labor with a deduction of 15% of wages and restriction of liberty for a period of one and a half years.
09.12.2024 – Five Jehovah’s Witnesses were arrested in Moscow
Sova – On December 5, 2024, after searches of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Moscow and Lyubertsy, Moscow region, as part of the investigation of the criminal case under Art. 282.2 of the Criminal Code on involvement in an extremist organization, five believers were detained – Oksana Ivanova, Larisa Kislaya, Liliana Korol, Daria Petrochenko and Zaur Murtuzov, who was charged under Parts 1 and 1.1 of Art. 282.2 of the Criminal Code (organization of the activities of an extremist organization and involvement of others in it). The court sent Murtuzov, Korol and Petrochenko to the pre-trial detention center, and Kisluya and Ivanova – under house arrest.
According to Jehovah’s Witnesses, during the searches, law enforcement officers hit one of the believers on the head and stomach and broke his nose.
06.12.2024 – A Falun Gong follower was arrested in Moscow
Sova – On December 6, 2024, the Tushinsky Court of Moscow chose a preventive measure in the form of detention against Gennady Buslov, accused of cooperation with Falun Gong.
He is accused under Part 3 of Art. 284.1 of the Criminal Code (organization of the activities of a foreign or international non-governmental organization in respect of which a decision has been made to recognize it as undesirable on the territory of the Russian Federation).
Earlier, the same court detained Natalia Minenkova, who was in the same case.
04.12.2024 – A verdict was handed down in Pyatigorsk in the case of cooperation with Falun Gong
Sova – On November 27, 2024, the Pyatigorsk City Court of the Stavropol Territory sentenced Oksana Shchetkina, accused of cooperation with one of the Falun Gong organizations, whose activities were recognized as undesirable on the territory of Russia.
The court found her guilty under Part 3 of Art. 284.1 of the Criminal Code (organization of the activities of an undesirable organization) and sentenced to imprisonment for a period of two years in a general regime colony.
06.12.2024 – New wave of searches of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Moscow and the region
JW – On December 5, 2024, at least eight homes of Jehovah’s Witnesses were searched in Moscow and Lyubertsy near Moscow. In one of the cases, the security forces used force. Five believers—Zaur Murtuzov, Daria Petrochenko, Liliana Korol, Larisa Kislaya, and Oksana Ivanova—were sent to the temporary detention facility. A criminal case has been initiated.
In the early morning, operational officers of the Investigative Committee and the FSB, accompanied by the National Guard and SOBR, broke into the houses of believers, waking them up with loud knocks on the door. In some apartments, law enforcement officers (numbering from five to eight people, some of them were wearing masks and with weapons) broke down the doors using crowbars and sledgehammers. According to one of the believers, in her case the police turned out to be witnesses.
06.12.2024 – Wives of prisoners of conscience from Blagoveshchensk sentenced to forced labor
JW- On December 6, 2024, the Blagoveshchensk City Court announced the conviction of four women, Jehovah’s Witnesses. Judge Stanislav Stanishevskiy sentenced them to different terms of punishment for their faith: Kristina Golik and Valentina Yermilova — 2.5 years each, and Mariya Myasnikova and Yekaterina Olshevskaya — two years and two months of forced labor with the deduction of 10% of the salary to the state.
Searches, interrogations, arrest of relatives and separation from them — according to the recollections of believers, they went through a lot during the six years of criminal prosecution of their families. Husbands of Golik, Yermilova and Olshevskaya were sentenced to long terms for their faith. In addition to that, Yekaterina’s father also faced such a fate.
03.12.2024 – Another sentence for faith in Kursk: Two spouses and another Jehovah’s Witness sent to colony
JW – On December 2, 2024, Margarita Dyadyusheva, judge of the Leninsky District Court of Kursk, sentenced three of Jehovah’s Witnesses: Nikolay Kupriyansky received 6 years in a penal colony, spouses Dmitriy and Oksana Chausov — 2 and a half years. The believers were taken into custody in the courtroom.
The criminal prosecution of Kupriyansky and the Chausovs began with searches in the summer of 2023. They were led by Maksim Zaitsev, an investigator of the FSB Directorate for the Kursk region, who had previously led a case against five other Jehovah’s Witnesses from Kursk. Dmitriy Chausov was sent to a pre-trial detention center, which is why he had to interrupt the treatment of a serious illness.
02.12.2024 – In the Rostov region, the Muslim community was fined for an unmarked book
Sova – On December 1, 2024, it became known that on October 9, the Semikarakorsky Court of the Rostov region left unchanged the September decision of the magistrate’s court, which fined the local religious organization of Muslims of the Semikarakor district for “illegal missionary work”.
In August, on the complaint of the district prosecutor’s office, an administrative case was initiated against the community because of the discovery of a book of religious content, but without the necessary marking. The Magistrate’s Court found the community guilty under Part 3 of Art. 5.26 of the Code of Administrative Offenses (implementation of activities by a religious organization without specifying its official full name, including the release or distribution of unmarked literature within the framework of missionary activities) and fined it 30 thousand rubles.
Imam Ismail Akhmedov said that the community had no money, but the court decided that the lack of finances was not documented, and the fine can be paid in installments.
Now the district court confirmed this decision.