TURKMENISTAN: You're not going on a summer holiday

Members of a Baptist Church from northern Turkmenistan had just arrived for a shared summer holiday in Avaza on the Caspian Sea when the local police officer, eight officials in civilian clothes and the imam (who is also the state-appointed religious affairs official) raided their accommodation, Protestants told Forum 18 News Service. The officials and imam insulted and threatened the visitors over three days because of their faith and church members had to abandon their holiday. Meanwhile, none of the eight known religious prisoners of conscience (one Protestant and seven Jehovah's Witnesses) is known to have been freed in the presidentially-decreed late August amnesty. Not freed was Protestant Pastor Ilmurad Nurliev, who has spent a year in custody on what church members say were trumped-up charges to punish him for leading his church. His wife is "so disappointed," one of their friends told Forum 18. "She again sits at home and cries."

2 September 2011

KAZAKHSTAN: New Religion Law to "bring order to our house"

Human rights defenders and members of religious communities the government does not like have already expressed concern to Forum 18 News Service over the proposed amendments to make the Religion Law harsher. President Nursultan Nazarbaev told Parliament on 1 September that the amendments are to be adopted "in the current session", which concludes in June 2012. He complained of unregistered communities which the state does not control, insisting: "We must bring order to our house." The head of the government's Agency of Religious Affairs, Kairat Lama Sharif, told the media the amendments his Agency has prepared (which have not been made public) will soon go to Parliament. Once adopted, the Law will require re-registration. "We are not expecting anything good from these new developments," one Protestant told Forum 18. Ninel Fokina of the Almaty Helsinki Committee told Forum 18 she fears the new amendments will be "essentially the same text" as the restrictive previous amendments declared unconstitutional by Kazakhstan's Constitutional Council in 2009. The OSCE told Forum 18 the Kazakh government has not asked for its assistance.

1 September 2011

KAZAKHSTAN: Expelled for preaching in own church

After legal residence in Kazakhstan for 15 years, marriage to a Kazakh citizen and a two-year-old daughter, Russian citizen Leonid Pan was in mid-August denied his application to renew his residence permit because he volunteers to preach in his local Protestant church, according to documentation seen by Forum 18 News Service. The local Internal Policy Department had already refused permission for him to become leader of the church. "How can the Migration Police, without having a Court order, demand that Leonid leave the country?" church members complained to Forum 18. The KNB secret police denied to Forum 18 it was involved in the expulsion. Meanwhile, another Baptist was in August fined nearly five months' official minimum wage for holding an unregistered worship service. State restrictions on religious communities are likely to increase with the new Religion Law amendments, due to be considered in the new session of Parliament which opened today (1 September).

31 August 2011

RUSSIA: "The fantasy of the special services"?

Readers of the works of the late Turkish Muslim theologian Said Nursi claim prosecutors planted "evidence" of how to make explosives during a raid on a flat in Chelyabinsk where Muslim women meet to pray. Two Nursi readers – one of whom was running a summer school for local girls also raided - now face criminal prosecution. Nursi readers described to Forum 18 News Service claims that they were running schools for future suicide martyrs as "the fantasy of the special services". The Department for Especially Important Cases refused to discuss with Forum 18 why prosecutors had made accusations that the two women were preparing suicide bombers as if they were fact if the investigation has not been concluded. Meanwhile, the criminal case against four Nursi readers in the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk has finally reached court after a 17-month investigation, with the preliminary hearing today (31 August). Only one of the four has been allowed to use his own lawyer. In the long-running trial of Jehovah's Witness Aleksandr Kalistratov, prosecutors have called as prosecution witnesses two Russian Orthodox, neither of whom personally knows Kalistratov.

26 August 2011

UZBEKISTAN: More fines, physical abuse and religious literature destruction

Police who raided a Protestant family's private home in Fergana assaulted the husband and confiscated religious literature, local Protestants told Forum 18 News Service. The religious books are being checked and officials are preparing an administrative case against the husband and wife and a family friend. Asked by Forum 18 what literature found in their home was banned, the Police Inspector who led the raid identified the Bible and the New Testament. Courts in the capital Tashkent and eastern Syrdarya Region have handed down fines of up to one hundred times the minimum monthly wage to ten Protestants to punish them for unregistered activity. In both cases the courts ordered that confiscated Christian literature - including Bibles and New Testaments – be destroyed. Officials of the state Religious Affairs Committee refused to explain why peaceful religious activity continues to be punished and why courts order the destruction of religious literature. "I am no expert in those matters, and you called the wrong department," Zulhaydar Sultanov, Head of its International Relations Department, told Forum 18.

25 August 2011

AZERBAIJAN: Victims to challenge "exorbitant" fines to Strasbourg?

Jehovah's Witnesses have described as "exorbitant" the administrative fines handed down to three of their members in Gyanja for holding a religious meeting. One was given a fine of nearly 18 months' official minimum wage, while the other two were each fined nearly six months' minimum wage. A fourth was officially warned. They are considering appeals to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. Forum 18 News Service notes that this is the first time the higher fines for religious activity introduced in December 2010 are known to have been imposed. Two Muslims who read the works of Said Nursi were acquitted of similar charges in August after a police raid on their meeting. Meanwhile, Hidayat Orujev, head of the State Committee for Work with Religious Organisations, has instructed the Muslim Board to amend its statute. He also warned that it is "unacceptable" for mosques to follow religious calendars that they choose and to decide whether to hold only Shia or Sunni prayers and events. The spokesperson for the State Committee denied to Forum 18 that this represents interference in the Muslim community's internal affairs.

23 August 2011

TURKEY: Changes in school religious education fail to resolve fundamental problems

When children begin school on 19 September, they should have new official textbooks for the compulsory Religious Culture and Knowledge of Ethics course, for which exemption is highly limited. For the first time the books are due to include teaching not just of Sunni Islam but of Alevi and Caferi traditions, both widely shared movements within Islam in Turkey, Forum 18 News Service notes. This year also saw a slight easing to allow exemption of Jehovah's Witness children in families who have left the religious section of their official records blank. Yet such changes fail to tackle the fundamental religious freedom problems over the course: the subject remains compulsory, the function of the course – whether it is about religions or the narrow teaching of one faith only (Islam) - is not clarified, exemptions remain limited and require parents to declare their religious or philosophical views, and there is a risk that exempted children suffer bullying from other children and lowered grades from teachers in other subjects. To ensure respect for freedom of religion and belief for all in education, Turkey should consider approaching the matter in a holistic manner.

16 August 2011

TAJIKISTAN: Ban on children in worship "once Ramadan is over"?

Although the highly controversial Law on Parental Responsibility for Education and Upbringing of Children has entered into force, state Religious Affairs officials have failed to explain to religious communities how its near-complete ban on children's participation in religious activity will be enforced. The head of the government's Religious Affairs Committee, Abdurahim Holikov, has been travelling around Tajikistan to explain the new Law to imams, together with the government-backed head of the Islamic Centre Saimukarram Abdukodirzoda, but what they said remains unclear. Several Christian communities tried to find out from the Committee at a 12 August meeting. "Officials explained that the Law exists, but didn't explain how it will be put into practice," one Catholic told Forum 18 News Service. Hikmatullo Sayfullozoda of the Islamic Renaissance Party told Forum 18 he had heard that "the President gave a verbal instruction to local administrations not to touch people during [the Muslim holy month of] Ramadan". Sayfullozoda fears that the authorities will act once Ramadan is over at the end of August.

4 August 2011

BELARUS: "Inmates are afraid of exercising their religious freedom rights"

In Belarus non-Orthodox prisoners face difficulties in exercising their freedom of religion or belief, Forum 18 News Service has found. In maximum security prisons, "prison administrations make prisoners face a difficult choice whom to see once a year - either clergy or relatives", lawyer Vlasta Oleksuk told Forum 18. All prisoners sentenced to death – such as Andrei Burdyka executed in July – are denied the possibility to meet clergy before their execution, even if they request this. There are also problems in ordinary prisons, for example Muslims having no allowance made for their diet. Anatoly Tunchik of the Punishment Implementation Department, asked about visits by non-Orthodox clergy, replied: "We are very strict at not admitting any random person into prisons. Sometimes", he continued, "they disguise themselves as other religions and have a negative influence over the inmates. For this reason access is only possible for Orthodox and Catholic priests, which means registered religions". Many convicts and clergy of different religions were not even aware of the rights they had. Also, "inmates are afraid of exercising their religious freedom rights, as they fear that the prison staff's attitude will be tougher", Protestant Pastor Boris Chernoglaz told Forum 18.

2 August 2011

UZBEKISTAN: "Spiritually rich and for freedom of conscience and religion" ?

An indictment has been filed against a Baptist in Uzbekistan's capital Tashkent, Forum 18 News Service has learned. Konstantin Malchikovsky is accused of not paying in monies from church offerings and book sales. Baptists strongly dispute the charges, describing them as "absurd", and noting that they "violate the Religion Law". They also note that courts have ignored what they describe as "exhaustive proofs of falsification and forgery of documents by the tax authorities". The charges have, as in previous cases, been accompanied by a hostile campaign in the state-run media accusing Baptists among other things of running an "illegal training centre". After attacking work with children, an article claims that Uzbekistan has "created an environment where all conditions exist for children to grow spiritually rich and for freedom of conscience and religion". In other cases, a computer hard disk belonging to another Protestant has been ordered to be destroyed, and a prisoner of conscience on a ten year jail sentence for exercising freedom of religion or belief, Tohar Haydarov, has had his sentence confirmed by the Supreme Court.

28 July 2011

KAZAKHSTAN: "One nation – one religion"?

Kazakhstan's President Nursultan Nazarbaev has called for increased surveillance of religious communities. Earlier, the head of the new state Agency of Religious Affairs (ARA) stated that the country had chosen "one nation – one religion" and that the ARA will "prepare a concept on the 'Development of moderate Islam in Kazakhstan'". This may echo Muslim Board calls to "restrict permitted Islam to the Hanafi school". Local people have told Forum 18 that the ARA is also expected to work on legislation further restricting freedom of religion or belief in the country. Yesterday (27 July), a ban on Shymkent's Ahmadi Muslim Community's right to use its mosque was upheld, but the community can continue to use the building until an appeal is decided. "The authorities are not just going against us", an Ahmadi commented. Changes have also been made to the Criminal and Administrative Codes, whose overall impact is – a legal expert stated - to "give more freedom to state agencies to interfere with freedom of religion or belief and go unpunished". "Who will now protect us from 'law-enforcement' agencies breaking the law?" a Kazakh religious believer, who wished to remain unnamed, asked Forum 18.

27 July 2011

AZERBAIJAN: Warned for meeting without state permission, legal status applications still delayed

After a police raid in Azerbaijan's port city of Sumgait in mid-June, a judge gave the leader of a Baptist church, Pavel Byakov, a verbal warning not to meet for worship without state permission. The judge also warned that for a second "offence" Byakov will be fined, church members who asked not to be named for fear of state reprisals told Forum 18 News Service. A large quantity of literature confiscated in the raid has been given to the State Committee for Work with Religious Organisations, to decide whether the material is legal. Prolonged delays in dealing with applications for legal status still continue, over one and half years after the deadline for processing applications. In defiance of Azerbaijan's international human rights commitments unregistered religious activity is illegal. Two religious communities – Cathedral of Praise Protestant Church and Baku's Jehovah's Witness community - have challenged the State Committee's failure to re-register them through the courts, and Cathedral of Praise today (27 July) gained a court ruling that they should be re-registered. But it still remains unclear when or if this will happen.