"GOD SIMPLY STILL HASN'T GIVEN UP." FOUR DAYS UNTIL THE BAN OF JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES IN RUSSIA

Will they change methods of ministry, violate the law, or all emigrate?

On 20 April the Russian Supreme Court found the organization of Jehovah's Witnesses to be extremist and prohibited its activity in our country. (An appeal of this decision was filed and it has not taken legal effect.) The Ministry of Justice discovered "violations of the charter goals of the organization and of current legislation in the RF," in particular, violation of the federal law "On combating extremist activity." The religious literature of the Witnesses (brochures, booklets, magazines Watchtower" and "Awake," etc.) have also been found to be extremist and their distribution has been prohibited. The property of the organization and of 396 Kingdom Halls (including the enormous complex of the headquarters of the Russian affiliate, "Administrative Center," in St. Petersburg) by the decision of the court will go to the benefit of the government.

Court refuses to grant habeas corpus to Danish Jehovah's Witness

IMPRISONED JEHOVAH'S WITNESS DENNIS CHRISTENSEN: "I AM COLD AND MY BIBLE WAS TAKEN AWAY FROM ME"

The Dane is the first Jehovist who was placed behind bars after the organization's ban.

 

Photos: Court building in Orel

The Orel provincial court on 21 June rejected the appeal against his detention from Danish citizen Dennis Christensen, who is charged with arranging the activity of an extremist organization. Christensen is the first Jehovah's Witness imprisoned in Russia after the prohibition of the organization by the Supreme Court. During the session, the Dane's defense attorney insisted on the groundlessness of his retention in custody and the defendant himself complained about the harsh conditions of being in the SIZO and he asked the court to release him to his family. A correspondent of Otkrytaya Rossia [Open Russia] observed the session.

DEPUTIES WANT TO BAN JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES BECAUSE OF THEIR RAPID GROWTH IN RUSSIA

The Sakhalin provincial duma supported an appeal by their colleagues from the Arkhangelsk provincial assembly for banning the religious organization of Jehovah's Witnesses in Russia. The deputies saw the reason for the ban not in the violation of any law but in the fact that "the number of Witnesses is growing at threatening rates."
 
Amazement is provoked by a whole series of facts.

Sixteen Jehovah’s Witnesses may be Russia’s most pacifist ‘extremists’

TAGANROG, RUSSIA — Alexey Koptev’s transformation from a respected Soviet factory foreman to suspected extremist began in 1992, when two Jehovah’s Witnesses knocked on his front door to ask whether he kept a Bible at home.

The visit sparked a fateful religious revival in Koptev and his wife, who converted two years later in a seaside baptism. In 2011, Koptev, 71, became the target of an undercover police sting because of his ties to the religious organization, which now shares the same legal status in this city as the Islamic State or the neo-Nazi National Socialist Society.

Russia Should Embrace Its Religious Diversity

How will Europe's human rights court respond to a government that treats a pacifist religious group as a dangerous extremist cell? The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) will answer that question this summer when it rules on whether Russia's prosecution of Jehovah's Witnesses under its extremism law criminalizes freedom of religion or belief.

A ruling against the Kremlin could be a landmark decision for Russia, affecting not only Jehovah's Witnesses. From Muslims to dissenting members of the Moscow Patriarchate Russian Orthodox Church (MPROC), other Russians are also caught in the wide net cast by this overly broad law.

Russia’s Jehovah's Witnesses have scored a rare legal victory

After years of problems, the religious group scores a rare legal victory. A Moscow court had banned them in 2004.

Moscow  – Russia’s Jehovah's Witnesses have scored a rare legal victory. The Russian Justice Ministry had officially registered their Moscow branch as a religious organisation, this according to a statement issued yesterday by the group’s press service.
The press released noted that it had been banned in 2004 by a Moscow court, accused of recruiting children, encouraging the faithful to abandon their families, inciting suicide and preventing their followers from accepting medical treatment.
In 2010, the European Court of Human Rights called the ruling unjustified and ordered it be overturned.
For years, Jehovah’s Witnesses have faced legal problems in Russia (pictured: a

Russia: Trials of Jehovah’s Witnesses Continue

Taganrog re-trial of 16 Jehovah’s Witnesses continues

After multiple delays, the re-trial of 16 Jehovah’s Witnesses charged with “continuing the activities of an extremist organisation” after their community was dissolved in 2009 began on 18 March at Taganrog City Court. There have been 10 hearings so far, and a further six adjournments because of a defendant’s illness or for “other reasons”, according the court website. The next hearing is due to take place on 27 May.