A criminal case was opened against a follower of Said Nursi in Blagoveshchensk

On December 31, 2015, it became known that a resident of the village of Ivanovka, Muslim Yevgeny Kim, was arrested in the city of Blagoveshchensk, Amur Region. He was charged under Part 2 of Article 282.2 (participation in the activities of a public or religious association or other organization in respect of which a court has made a final decision to liquidate or ban activities in connection with extremist activities) for allegedly participating in the activities of the religious organization "Nurcular" banned in Russia. At the moment, Yevgeny Kim is in a pre-trial detention center in the city of Blagoveshchensk, Amur Region.

The investigation in the case believes that Kim allegedly propagated the ideas of the organization and distributed banned literature for seven years. Experts from the Krasnoyarsk State Pedagogical University conducted a psychological and linguistic examination of Kim's statements submitted by law enforcement agencies, in which they revealed signs of inciting ethnic and religious hatred.

According to a letter received by OVD-Info from one of the witnesses in this case, a Muslim, a resident of Blagoveshchensk Anton Starodubtsev, on December 26, 2015, at about seven or eight in the evening, Starodubtsev, together with their Muslim acquaintances, gathered in Kim’s apartment for a festive feast with children in honor of of the recently passed birthday of the Prophet Muhammad, when people in uniform, balaclavas and helmets broke into the apartment. Without presenting any documents, they began to threaten with machine guns and rudely forced all those present to lie down on the floor, after which they handcuffed them and left them lying in that position for about five hours. At this time, Kim was taken to the next room for a conversation. Then similar conversations were held with the rest of those present, after which they were put on a bus and taken to the FSB investigation department, where the interrogations continued. As part of the investigation of this case, searches have already been carried out at the homes and workplaces of many of Kim's acquaintances, and at the moment they continue to be called in for questioning.

According to the Sova Information and Analytical Center, neither the ban on the books of Said Nursi, nor the ban on the Nurcular association, which did not exist in Russia at all (there are individual believers who face unreasonable persecution for studying Nursi's books) is not lawful.