Two more editions of the book “What Does the Bible Really Teach?” have been added to the list of extremist materials. and Bibles of Jehovah's Witnesses

They were found on the Egyptian during a customs inspection of the ship.

On December 4, 2025, the books “What Does the Bible Really Teach?” were added to the Federal List of Extremist Materials. (2015 edition) and “Holy Scripture. New World Translation (2008). The latter is the Bible of Jehovah's Witnesses.

The decision to ban them was made on May 16, 2025 by the Leningrad Regional Court following a claim by the Baltic Customs. The books were found during a customs inspection of a ship that arrived at the port of Ust-Luga, from the senior engineer, an Egyptian citizen named Muhamed Elsaid Ali Darwish Mekki. He became the defendant in the lawsuit; The Egyptian's interests were represented by a court-appointed lawyer.

Customs substantiated the claim with the conclusion of an expert from the Nizhny Novgorod branch of the Central Forensic Customs Administration. According to the conclusion, the publications revealed “a set of linguistic and psychological signs of “extremist” meanings, namely propaganda of the views of the organization “Administrative Center of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Russia” banned in Russia.” In addition, they contained signs of “information that could harm the political or economic interests of the member states of the Eurasian Economic Union, their state security, and the health and morals of citizens.”

Other editions of What Does the Bible Really Teach? were banned in 2009 and 2013 (paragraphs 510 , 2034 of the Federal List). The New World Translation (March 2014 edition) was banned in 2017 (n.4488 ).

We believe that recognizing both the Bible translated by Jehovah's Witnesses and their other publications as extremist is unlawful, and we regard such bans as manifestations of religious discrimination. We wrote more about the ban on the New World Translation here and here .

Sources

• Extremist materials // Ministry of Justice of Russia. 2025. December 4.
• Administrative case card No. 3a-92/2025 ~ M-64/2025 // Leningrad Regional Court. 2025. October 6.