Jehovah witness religion1/10/2023 “I think the state legitimately does see them as a threat,” said Baran. A remarkable amount of resources, including wiretapping and extensive surveillance, has been used in the hopes of catching someone in the act of discussing their faith or the Bible with another person, acts which are deemed extremist under the Russian law. The group’s Russian website is updated almost daily with news of new raids, arrests, and convictions. “The Witnesses are just one piece of that larger picture in which Russia is not drawing a huge distinction between al Qaeda, a Jehovah’s Witness and a 20-something on the internet,” said Baran.īut what is distinct about the assault on the Jehovah’s Witnesses is its ferocity and persistence. Journalists, activists, and social media users have been arrested and imprisoned for questioning the annexation of Crimea or Russia’s involvement in the conflict in Syria. Russia has become increasingly authoritarian in recent years, and the country’s vague and expansive extremism laws are one of many tools that have been used to stifle dissenting voices. Isn’t this just part of Russia’s broader crackdown? Still, Verkhovsky noted, Jehovah’s Witnesses are experiencing a much harsher crackdown than other U.S-tied religious groups, such as Seventh-Day Adventists and Pentacostals. While religious groups were exempt from the law, Jehovah’s witnesses ties to the United States-where the group developed in the late 19th century and where its headquarters remain-likely drew further scrutiny from the Russian authorities. Civil society organizations and human rights groups which received foreign funding were subject to invasive and debilitating new rules under a law on foreign agents passed shortly after Putin returned to power in 2012. ![]() Putin dialed up hostility to the West, and in particular the United States, which he accused of fomenting the protests against him. “I think it makes states that want a lot of control uncomfortable, because they can’t really control this community,” said Emily Baran, a history professor at Middle Tennessee State University.Īnd then there’s the American element. All of this made Jehovah’s Witnesses-who refuse military conscription based on their faith-all the more conspicuous. This new wave of patriotism was built around support for the armed forces and the Russian Orthodox Church, which is closely interwoven with the Russian state. “That looks very suspicious to our authorities,” said Alexander Verkhovsky, director of the Moscow-based SOVA Center for Information and Analysis, which tracks discrimination and misuse of Russia’s extremism laws.Īfter Vladimir Putin returned to the presidency in 2012 amid mass street protests against allegedly rigged elections, the Kremlin made a conscious effort to foment nationalism-and support for Putin. That might have spared them the arrests and harassment levied against protesters and opposition politicians in Russia, but their apolitical stance might have singled them out in other ways. Jehovah’s Witnesses remain politically neutral for religious reasons and do not vote, run for office, or protest. Jehovah’s Witnesses have been anything but extremist, and we’re certainly not dangerous or violent,” said Jarrod Lopes, a spokesperson for the group’s headquarters in the United States. “If it wasn’t so serious, it would be a joke. Jehovah’s Witnesses themselves are bewildered. The European Association of Jehovah’s Witnesses estimates that between 5,000 to 10,000 of its members have fled Russia since the ban came into force.Īs is often the case with authoritarian states, it’s hard to tell exactly what has prompted the crackdown-and there’s likely more than one reason. ![]() Since then, Russian law enforcement has raided the homes of more than 1,300 worshippers and over 400 have been either charged or convicted of extremism in a brutal crackdown which has swept up followers aged 19 to 90. In 2017, Russia’s Supreme Court declared the group an extremist organization, lumping its non-violent adherents into the same category as neo-Nazis and members of al Qaeda. So who are these scary extremists? Jehovah’s Witnesses, a Christian denomination with an estimated 175,000 followers in Russia. On Monday, in the Crimean port of Sevastopol, prosecutors sought seven years for a man charged with “organizing the activities of an extremist group.” ![]() ![]() The day before that, prosecutors in the Russian city of Smolensk asked a court to sentence three adherents of the same group to up to nine years behind bars. On Wednesday, authorities in Russian-occupied Crimea announced that they had arrested a 30-year-old man suspected of promoting an organization that had been banned and deemed extremist in Russia.
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