The court in Yugorsk acquitted two Jehovah’s Witnesses

The Yugorsky District Court of the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous District acquitted two Jehovah’s Witnesses, Ivan Sorokin and Andrey Zhukov, in the case of extremism. This was reported by the website “Jehovah’s Witnesses. Legal situation in Russia”.

Believers were accused of organizing the activities of an extremist group and being involved in it. In August 2020, a series of searches took place in KhMAO. 16 residents were interrogated, and Sorokina and Zhukov were placed in a detention center for a day. At the same time, a criminal case was initiated.

This is the third acquittal handed down to Jehovah’s Witnesses by Russian courts under the article on extremism. In November 2021, a court in Vladivostok found Dmitry Barmakin innocent, and in June 2022, a court in the Pskov region acquitted Alexei Khabarov. Later, both these sentences were overturned, and the cases were sent for review. As a result, in April 2023, Barmakin was sentenced to eight years in prison, the Sibir.Realii website notes.

• In the five years since Jehovah’s Witnesses were recognized as an extremist organization in Russia, more than 650 followers of this religious movement have been criminally prosecuted, and cases against 77 have been initiated in 2022 alone.
• In June 2022, the European Court of Human Rights ruled that the decisions of the Russian authorities to liquidate the church, ban its activities and seize property violated the rights of believers.