Defendants with their families and friends shortly before the verdict was announced (Saransk, August 2022)
The Appeal Court Upheld the Verdict Against Six Believers From Saransk. They Will Spend 2 to 6 Years in a Penal Colony
MordoviaOn January 16, 2023, the Supreme Court of the Republic of Mordovia upheld the sentence of six Jehovah's Witnesses from Saransk: 6 years imprisonment for Atryakhin, 4 years and 2 months in a penal colony for the Nikulins, and 2 years imprisonment for Shevchuk, Korolev, and Antonov.
The believers participated in the hearing via video conference while in the Detention Center No. 1 in Saransk, where they were placed after the verdict of the court of first instance. February 2023 will be exactly 4 years since the criminal prosecution of Aleksandr Shevchuk and his fellow believers began. Despite the decision of the court of appeal, all six continue to insist on their innocence and intend to defend their good name in the court of cassation.
In June 2022, the European Court of Human Rights unequivocally sided with Jehovah's Witnesses in Russia. The ruling states, among other things, that “the forced liquidation of all religious organizations of Jehovah's Witnesses in the Russian Federation ... has revealed signs of a policy of intolerance regarding the religious activities of Jehovah's Witnesses on the part of the Russian authorities, aimed at forcing Jehovah's Witnesses to abandon their faith and prevent others from joining it” (§254).
