The Novocherkassk City Court of the Rostov Region received the case of Jehovah's Witnesses Gevorg Yeritsyan, Garegin Khachaturyan and Lyubov Galitsina. This is reported by a portal covering the persecution of believers of this denomination.
The first meeting will take place on September 20.
In May it became known that Galitsyna’s health was deteriorating in the pre-trial detention center. The woman was diagnosed with diabetes and hypertension. In addition, she has hearing and vision problems. In February, the pre-trial detention center administration refused to give her a medical examination, saying that her illnesses do not prevent imprisonment “unless diabetes leads to gangrene.” The doctor was only allowed to see her in August.
On August 11, 2022, searches were carried out at ten addresses of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Novocherkassk. After investigative actions, Khachaturyan and Yeritsyan were detained and sent to a pre-trial detention center. Later, Galitsyna was summoned for questioning, and she also became an accused. Galitsyna is charged with participation in the activities of an extremist organization (Part 2 of Article 282.2 of the Criminal Code), and Khachaturyan and Yeritsyan are charged with organizing its activities (Part 1 of Article 282.2 of the Criminal Code).
- In 2017, the Supreme Court recognized the “Administrative Center of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Russia” as an extremist organization, liquidated it and banned its activities in Russia. All organizations of Jehovah's Witnesses were included in the list of prohibited ones, after which a stream of criminal cases against believers began. Rosfinmonitoring has added hundreds of Russian followers of Jehovah's Witnesses to the list of extremists and terrorists. Most of the people on the list are believers between 40 and 60 years old.
-
On June 7, 2022, the European Court of Human Rights declared the ban on Jehovah's Witnesses organizations and the subsequent persecution of believers 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.”
-
In October 2021, the Plenum of the Supreme Court clarified the application of “anti-extremist” legislation. The document, in particular, states that actions “consisting solely of the exercise of the right to freedom of conscience and freedom of religion, including through individual or joint professing of religion, performing divine services or other religious rites and ceremonies, do not in themselves constitute a crime , provided for in Part 2 of Article 282.2 of the Criminal Code (Participation in the activities of an extremist organization - OVD-Info ).” According to OVD-Info lawyer Tatyana Glushkova, these changes allow courts to terminate criminal cases brought against former members of liquidated religious organizations (for example, Jehovah's Witnesses).