KYRGYZSTAN: Seven year sentences despite "fabricated evidence" and "procedural violations"

Two cousins – both Jehovah's Witnesses – were sentenced on 18 May to seven years' imprisonment accused of having two DVDs in their private home claimed by the state to be extremist Islamic, Forum 18 News Service has learned. The two young men, Iskandar Kambarov and Jonibek Nosirov, insist the DVD discs must have been planted by police during a 29 January search of their flat at which they were arrested. The two have appealed against their conviction, noting "fabricated evidence" and "procedural violations". The two have been denied religious literature they have requested on the orders of the Judge who sentenced them, Judge Lutfulla Saliev. Forum 18 has been told that the judge's phone is broken. Two anti-terrorism police officers stated that they put the flat under surveillance because the two had been "preaching" and only went out after dark. No warrant was issued authorising the raid that accompanied the arrests. Until 4 February the police denied that the two were in detention, although court documents contradict this claim. No date has been set for the appeal.

19 May 2011

BELARUS: Priest's visit "inexpedient" / Fresh Criminal Code Article 193-1 threat

The Co-Chair of Belarus' Christian Democracy movement, Pavel Severinets, was for five months in detention repeatedly denied the possibility of a visit he requested from an Orthodox priest, he has told Forum 18 News Service. Severinets was speaking after he was given an open jail term for his political activities, at a trial along with two other opposition political activists and human rights defenders. The authorities admitted to Severinets that he had every legal right to see a priest, he told Forum 18. He suspects that the denial was due to his refusal to work for the KGB secret police as an informer, and his unwillingness to plead guilty to organising a riot. Elsewhere, Nikolai Varushin, a member of an unregistered Baptist church has been threatened with punishment under Criminal Code Article 193-1, which carries a maximum penalty of two years' imprisonment. This is the second recent occasion in which the use of Article 193-1 – which has not previously been used to repress freedom of religion or belief – has been threatened against an unregistered religious community.

18 May 2011

AZERBAIJAN: Police "did well" in Sumgait raids

Defending the raids in mid-May on three Protestant churches in Sumgait within three days was the press office of Azerbaijan's Interior Ministry. The police "did well", an official there told Forum 18 News Service. After a raid by up to 15 police officers on the Sunday worship service of one of the congregations, held in a local restaurant, two church members were today (18 May) each fined about two weeks' average local wages. On 17 May, some 20 police officers raided a private flat where members of another local church were meeting, seizing about 60 books. "You can't meet for religious purposes in a restaurant – there are mosques and synagogues for that," the Interior Ministry official insisted. He refused to give his name, telling Forum 18: "I don't know who you are. You might be a terrorist or Azerbaijan's enemy No. 1."

13 May 2011

AZERBAIJAN: Another Sunni mosque disappears, heavy fines feared

After Turkish imam Ahmet left the Azerbaijani exclave of Nakhichevan in February, the Sunni Juma Mosque was taken over by the Shia community, leaving local Sunni Muslims nowhere to pray in the way they wish, Forum 18 News Service has learnt. Forum 18 has been unable to establish whether the imam was forced to leave by the Nakhichevan authorities, or whether he left on completion of his term. Turkish diplomats refused to say. "No new appointment [of a Turkish imam] has yet been made, and we don't know when that will be," one told Forum 18. Meanwhile, two Jehovah's Witnesses face possible heavy fines for religious activity after religious literature was seized from their homes. Police and secret police joined the local Religious Affairs official to raid one. A Nursi reader had a Koran seized and faced police questioning in Mingechaur.

12 May 2011

UZBEKISTAN: April was the cruellest month

After a 5 April raid on his home by up to 10 police and secret police officers, Tashkent Protestant Anvar Rajapov was fined 80 times the minimum monthly wage for alleged proselytism, illegal religious meetings and illegal literature, Protestants told Forum 18 News Service. Judge Kholmurod Berdyklichev did not "even investigate the case but just signed the hastily and carelessly prepared decision", Protestants complained to Forum 18. The judge ordered that the religious books confiscated in the raid be destroyed, "except for those that can be allowed for internal use of religious communities". A member of Tashkent's registered Baptist church, Konstantin Malchikovsky, faces up to two years' imprisonment if a criminal case now with prosecutors goes ahead. He is accused of failing to use a cash register to record sales and donations to the church. In late April the congregation itself was given a massive fine for this. Church property was raided twice in April.

6 May 2011

KAZAKHSTAN: "Great political efforts are made"

Kazakhstan's President Nursultan Nazarbaev and the Mayor of the commercial capital Almaty have recently called for greater controls on unspecified religious communities, which they describe as "sects". The calls come as smaller religious communities are experiencing greater pressure including police and KNB secret police raids, Forum 18 News Service has found. Prominent in these measures are state-funded so-called anti-sect centres, which members of many religious communities state are encouraging public hostility through statements in the state-controlled national and local mass media. Communities targeted have included Hare Krishna devotees, Jehovah's Witnesses, and Protestants, described as "destructive religious movements". Also Ahmadi Muslims in the southern city of Shymkent are facing threats by the authorities to close their community down. It has been suggested to Forum 18 that the "anti-sect" campaign is intended to prepare the ground for restrictive laws against freedom of religion or belief.

4 May 2011

TURKEY: The Diyanet – the elephant in Turkey's religious freedom room?

The Diyanet, or Presidency of Religious Affairs, is a state institution reporting to the Prime Minster's Office and exerts a very large influence on the extent to which freedom of religion or belief can be enjoyed in Turkey, Forum 18 News Service notes. Massive state financial and institutional support of the Diyanet along with its activities - including its biases against Muslim and non-Muslim beliefs it dislikes - make it difficult for people inside and outside the Diyanet's structures to exercise freedom of religion or belief. This has been reinforced by the latest law governing the Diyanet, which increases its influence without addressing its current incompatibility with Turkey's human rights obligations. For a political party to propose removing the Diyanet from the state's structures would render that party liable to be closed down under Turkish law. Despite the need for change in the Diyanet-state relationship, civil society proposals for change have been described by the government as "unjust" and "too assertive for such a sensitive issue".

29 April 2011

TURKMENISTAN: Eleven religious prisoners of conscience in one camp

The arrival at the Seydi Labour Camp in eastern Turkmenistan of Sunet Japbarov and Dovran Matyakubov, Jehovah's Witness conscientious objectors, brought to eleven the number of religious prisoners of conscience held in this camp, Forum 18 News Service notes. Ten are conscientious objectors. Japbarov and Matyakubov each received 18-month prison terms in December 2010 for refusing compulsory military service. Concern is mounting among his friends for another of the religious prisoners in the Seydi Camp, Protestant Pastor Ilmurad Nurliev. The Labour Camp administration has refused to allow him medical treatment for his diabetes, for which he regularly visited a hospital before his August 2010 arrest. "Our first aim is restoring his health," his friends told Forum 18. Police who summoned members of his unregistered congregation warned: "if we find out the church has been meeting, we'll do the same to you as we did to Ilmurad".

20 April 2011

RUSSIA: "The main problem – the Law on Extremism – remains"

Following the acquittal in Russia of Jehovah's Witness Aleksandr Kalistratov, a Gorno-Altaisk Court spokesperson would not state if and when the full text of the verdict will be released, when Forum 18 News Service asked for this. It is unclear if the Prosecutor will appeal against the verdict. Aleksandr Verkhovsky of the SOVA Center told Forum 18 that "it's difficult to say what the verdict will mean for other cases. I would like this one to set a precedent but it depends a lot on the formal reasons why he was acquitted". Ziyavdin Dapayev, a Muslim from Dagestan also facing "anti-extremism" charges, told Forum 18 that he is not sure how, if at all, the verdict will affect his case and similar cases. He sees intimidation and prejudice at a local level as a more decisive factor than verdicts in "extremism" cases elsewhere. Jehovah's Witnesses spokesperson Grigory Martynov told Forum 18 that "the main problem – the Law on Extremism – remains in place. Our publications are still banned and people who have committed no crimes continue to be investigated and prosecuted." In a separate development, the European Court of Human Rights has begun considering the admissibility of a case concerning Russian bans on Islamic texts.

19 April 2011

UZBEKISTAN: Raids and confiscations as state wants "religious organisations which will stay quiet" ?

Uzbekistan's NSS secret police with other officials have carried out two raids on an officially registered Baptist church in the capital Tashkent, Forum 18 News Service has learned. Over 50,000 Christian books, a large quantity of printing and office equipment, and a sum of money personally belonging to one person were confiscated. In contrast to the confiscated literature and equipment, no official record was made of the confiscation of the money belonging to a church member was made. Later, three church leaders and the caretaker were given fines ranging between 50 and 100 times the minimum monthly salary. Officials have refused to give reasons for their actions, but there has recently been a harshening of official actions against the possession and supply of religious literature. One Tashkent Baptist, asked by Forum 18 what might be behind the raids and confiscations, commented: "The authorities are interested in having small pocket-size churches and religious organisations, which will stay quiet and not have much religious activity."

15 April 2011

UZBEKISTAN: Police assault Baptist, Imams fired, gift to Children's Home a "violation"

Uzbekistan has levied a large fine on a Baptist in the capital Tashkent – who was physically assaulted by police – for giving a children's Bible to a work colleague, Forum 18 News Service has learned. The policeman who assaulted Galina Shemetova denied to Forum 18 that he had done anything wrong. Possibly fuelled by the authorities concerns about the impact of the Arab Spring uprisings for freedom, three Tashkent Muslim clerics who studied in Arab countries have been dismissed from their posts. No reasons have been given for the dismissals, and officials refused to answer when asked by Forum 18 whether the dismissals had anything to do with where the clergymen studied. And the officially registered Zarafshan Baptist Church has been raided and given an official warning for making a financial gift to a local children's home. The raid followed the Church's required filing of its financial statements with the regional Justice Department, who then ordered the raid. Among a list of – disputed – violations found by officials is that a tap did not have a notice with the personal data of the person responsible for the Church's use of water. No officials would tell Forum 18 what will happen to the funds the Church gave the Happiness Children's Home.

13 April 2011

RUSSIA: More raids and trials, pressure on lawyers, defendant forced to resign from job?

Raids by Russian authorities on Jehovah's Witnesses and Muslim readers of the works of Said Nursi for alleged "extremism" continued in March, but none are yet known in April, Forum 18 News Service notes. Lawyers defending those charged have also reportedly coming under pressure from the authorities. One Jehovah's Witness facing trial in the southern region of Astrakhan, Gulfira Zakaryaeva, has stated that her employer was visited by law enforcement agents, who recommended that she be told to resign. She claims that she was told to do this of her own free will "to avoid any problems". Astrakhan Police told Forum 18 that "it is unlikely any pressure was applied" to her to resign, and her former employer declined to comment. Both groups of religious believers have been put under state surveillance, and Protestants in the far eastern Russian Republic of Sakha have received an intrusive questionnaire from the local police Centre for Combating Extremism. Police have refused to tell Forum 18 how this information will be used, or whether criminal cases will be opened against those questioned.