In the Krasnodar Territory, the cassation court commuted the sentences of four Jehovah's Witnesses from Astrakhan

On December 22, the Fourth Cassation Court of General Jurisdiction of the Krasnodar Territory commuted the sentence of Astrakhan Jehovah's Witnesses Rustam Diarov, Sergei Klikunov, Evgeniy and Olga Ivanov, who had previously been sentenced to real terms. The website “Jehovah's Witnesses in Russia” is about this.

reports Earlier, the verdict stated that after serving the term of imprisonment, the convicts would be prohibited from traveling outside Astrakhan. Now, according to the ruling of the cassation court, they will be able to choose a locality for residence.

Previously, the Trusovsky District Court of Astrakhan sentenced Diarov, Klikunov and Ivanov to eight years in prison under articles on organizing the activities of an extremist organization (Part 1 of Article 282.2 of the Criminal Code) and financing extremist activities (Part 1 of Article 282.3 of the Criminal Code), and Ivanov - to three years with half a year under the article on participation in the activities of an extremist organization (Part 2 of Article 282.2 of the Criminal Code). March 3 Astrakhan City Court verdicts.

sentenced approved According to investigators, the defendants organized meetings of believers, promoted their religious teachings and distributed literature. The security forces also claimed that Astrakhan Jehovah's Witnesses collected money for the activities of the community.

The text of the news has been changed in accordance with changes in the original source. It was previously reported that the sentence for Jehovah's Witnesses had been tightened. - On April 20, 2017, the Supreme Court liquidated the “Administrative Center of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Russia” extremist organization and banned its activities in Russia. In August, all organizations of Jehovah's Witnesses were added to the list of prohibited organizations. After this, a stream of criminal cases against Jehovah's Witnesses throughout Russia. admitted introduced began - In 2022, the European Court of Human Rights banning the organizations of Jehovah's Witnesses and the subsequent persecution of believers is illegal. From the point of view of the ECHR, the decision to liquidate the organization and criminal cases against Jehovah’s Witnesses is based on an overly broad definition of “extremism”, which in Russian legislation “can be applied to absolutely peaceful forms of expression.” admitted