6 Hizb ut-Tahrir members arrested in St. Petersburg

On November 9, the Kirovsky District Court of St. Petersburg arrested until November 30 six Muslims suspected of participating in the terrorist organization Hizb ut-Tahrir. This was reported on the Rosbalt website.

According to Interfax, three of the six arrested are natives of Dagestan, one is from Tajikistan. All suspects are charged with Part 1 of Art. 205.5 of the Criminal Code (organizing the activities of a terrorist organization banned in the Russian Federation).

Later, the Caucasian Knot reported the names of those arrested: residents of St. Petersburg M. Tsvetkov and V. Shmotov, Dagestanis A. Akhmedov, I. Akhmedov and E. Mamedov and citizen of Tajikistan A. Yusufov.

In August 2016, the Moscow District Military Court, at a visiting session in St. Petersburg, sentenced Eldar Ramazanov and Karim Ibragimov to 16 and 17 years in prison in a maximum security colony, finding them guilty of creating a Hizb ut-Tahrir cell in St. Petersburg, and Ilyas Kagirov for participation in the organization of 5 years of imprisonment in a general regime colony.

Hizb ut-Tahrir is recognized as a terrorist organization in Russia. The SOVA Information and Analytical Center, which monitors and analyzes both manifestations of racism and xenophobia and cases of unlawful application of anti-terrorism legislation, emphasized that recognizing an organization as terrorist is unlawful.