This fact must be clearly demonstrated
On 28 October, the Supreme Court Plenary adopted a number of resolutions, including a recommendation to change the practice of assessing cases involving persons who have something to do with banned religious organizations: The fact of sending religious ceremonies or beliefs, stressed by the Supreme Court, can not be considered a crime.
liability of persons in relation to whom it was not ascertained what specific acts related to the renewal resp. the continuation of the activities of the extremist organization they committed and what motives they followed. “
the exercise of the right to freedom of conscience and freedom of religion, including through individual or joint religion, worship or other religious rites and ceremonies, provided that they do not contain signs of extremism. “
Are there any banned religious organizations in the country whose members have been tried or investigated? The question for many Russians, for example, of professing non-Christianity outside the main denominations, is more than relevant. Why did the sun suddenly start addressing this problem again? Elena Peisiková also informed about this: the resolution was prepared on the initiative and with the participation of the HRC under the leadership of the President.
A remarkable example that many people immediately remembered was the citizens professing Christianity in the version of Jehovah's Witnesses. In 2017, the activities of the organizational structure of the “Administrative Center for Jehovah's Witnesses in Russia” and 395 of its regional branches of the armed forces were declared extremist. With regard to believers, cases were opened and decisions were made.
Russian religious and public figure, writer and theologian Andrei Kuraev, whom we asked to evaluate the significance of this decision, expressed the hope that this document of the Verkhovna Rada as a whole may indicate some serious changes in attitudes.
“I still hope that this is a serious change, even though the Supreme Court's explanation has previously been made that the police misinterpret 'party and state policy' in this matter. This means that the organization of Jehovah's Witnesses itself is not forbidden. Therefore, you cannot arrest a person just because he belongs to him. The court's position in this case is perfectly fair: there can be no collective responsibility, the guilt of each individual person must be proven in each specific case. This may not be the fault of meetings and prayers, but the spread of views that are considered extremist. I can quite agree with this. Another thing is that the very qualification, their recognition as extremists, is pulled by the hair and very shameless. Because Jehovah's Witnesses are radical in one thing only: they are radical pacifists. This means that in this sense, they simply do not pose a threat, “says Kuraev. He disagrees with the statement that a court decision can only affect two hundred convicted or investigated “Jehovah's Witnesses”: “There are cases where both prayer meetings and Baptists are closed.”
He is unwilling to agree that we are talking about serious changes in policy towards religious organizations: “We believe that the courts are out of politics. Therefore, the decision of the armed forces is one thing, but politics can be something else entirely. I am afraid that in Russia, in the event of a conflict between the title and the direct superior's order, the latter will win. “To assess the decision taken, the expert suggests waiting a few months and looking at the situation:/p>