In Primorye, a Court Found Three of Jehovah's Witnesses, Including a 72-year-old Woman, to Be Extremists. They Received Suspended Sentence

On February 3, 2022, the judge of the Lesozavodskiy District Court of the Primorye Territory Sergey Yarovenko found Yevgeniy Grinenko, Sergey Kobelev and Svetlana Yefremova guilty of extremism because of their religious activity. The men received a 6-year suspended sentence with a 5-year probation period, and the elderly believer received a 3-year suspended sentence with a 2-year probation period, as requested by the prosecutor.

The believers consider the decision unjust and have the right to appeal it. “No matter how hard they try to accuse me of extremism, I still consider the accusation unfounded and unfair,” Yevgeniy Grinenko said, addressing the court with his final statement. — “Jehovah's Witnesses are known throughout the world as friendly and peaceful people. Their rights are respected in the vast majority of countries in the world. I would very much like the rights of believers to be respected in Russia too, and in this case, my rights.”

A criminal case against Yevgeniy Grinenko was initiated in May 2020 by Oksana Belyakova, an investigator for especially important cases of the Investigative Department for the city of Lesozavodsk of the Investigative Department of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation for the Primorye Territory. In March and April 2021, Svetlana Yefremova, Sergey Kobelev, and his mother Galina also became defendants (Galina's case was later made into a separate proceeding, and the court gave her a 6-year suspended sentence on similar charges). In September of the same year, the case went to court. The charges were based on covert audio and video recordings made by two informants who feigned an interest in the Bible. Conversations on Bible topics and peaceful religious meetings were considered by law enforcement agencies to be the resumption of the activity of a banned organization.

Sergey Kobelev noted in his final statement: “Everything I did is lawful ... And all the evidence of my guilt presented by the prosecution proves only that I am a follower of Jesus Christ and, just like him, I put the will of God first."

Svetlana Yefremova, speaking before the court, also drew attention to the absurdity of the prosecution of believers: “I ended up in court because I do not want to renounce my God, and not because of a crime or violation of state laws. As a citizen of the Russian Federation, I have enjoyed the right [to freedom of religion] for almost 30 years. The article has remained unchanged to this day, and my behavior has not got worse over those years. Then the question arises: why am I being prosecuted?

A total of 19 criminal cases were initiated in the Primorye Territory against 46 Jehovah's Witnesses. In 8 cases, the verdict has already entered into force and 7 cases are being considered in courts.

On June 7, 2022, the European Court of Human Rights found it unlawful to ban the legal entities of Jehovah's Witnesses and criminalize the followers of this religion. In its ruling, the court noted, in particular: “The forced dissolution of all religious organisations of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Russia was not merely the result of a neutral application of legal provisions but disclosed indications of a policy of intolerance by the Russian authorities towards the religious practices of Jehovah’s Witnesses designed to cause Jehovah’s Witnesses to abandon their faith and to prevent others from joining it” (§254).