Followers of the banned Tablighi Jamaat movement were sentenced in Orenburg

A resident of the Orenburg region Alexander Shudobaev received under Art. 282.2 of the Criminal Code six and a half years in prison, nine more residents of the region - two and two and a half years each. They were found guilty of organizing the activities of Tablighi Jamaat, a movement that, in our opinion, was illegally banned.

On March 11, 2019, the Central District Court of Orenburg issued a verdict in the case of ten followers of the Islamic movement Tablighi Jamaat, who were accused of organizing the activities of an extremist organization and participating in it (parts 1 and 2 of article 282.2 of the Criminal Code).

The defendants were arrested in 2017. According to investigators , in January 2015 they created a cell of a banned organization and " persuaded new adherents to join the organization, performed religious rites specific to this organization, including in the course of missionary activity ." Three of them have already been convicted under Art. 282.2 of the Criminal Code, and Alexander Shudobaev, recognized as the leader of the cell, had a criminal record for organizing the activities of Tablighi Jamaat (in 2013 he was sentenced to a fine) and for drug trafficking.

Shudobaev under Part 1 of Art. 282.2 of the Criminal Code (organization of the activities of an extremist organization), the court sentenced to six years and six months in prison to be served in a strict regime colony with restriction of freedom for two years and three years of deprivation of the right to engage in activities related to the performance of administrative, economic and organizational and administrative functions in religious organizations. The rest of the defendants were convicted under Part 2 of Art. 282.2 of the Criminal Code (participation in the activities of an extremist organization). Konstantin Dorokhin, Kanat Krushenov and Rifat Khabibullin received two and a half years in prison, and Rakhimzhan Aimukhamedov, Tulegen Akbatyrov, Dilmurat Umerov, Yerzhan Aitov, Talgat Satubaldin and Vyacheslav Semakin received two years in prison with restriction of liberty for a year.

The religious association "Tablighi Jamaat" was banned in Russia in 2009, and we regard this ban as illegal. The movement was engaged in the propaganda of Islam and was not seen in any calls for violence, so we consider the persecution of its supporters to be unjustified.

Sources

• TWENTY-SIX YEARS OUT OF TEN: PARTICIPANTS OF THE EXTREMIIST ORGANIZATION TABLIGI JAMAAT HAVE BEEN SENTD // Vestirama.ru. March 11, 2019
• Case card No. 1-10/2019 (1-314/2018;) // Website of the Central District Court of Orenburg. March 11, 2019
• Organizer and members of extremist religious association convicted in Orenburg // Website of the prosecutor's office of the Orenburg region. March 12, 2019
• Memorial considers ten Muslims from Orenburg convicted in the case of the banned Tablighi Jamaat as political prisoners // HRC "Memorial". February 15, 2021
• Orenburg case of the banned Tablighi Jamaat // HRC "Memorial". February 10, 2021