![](\"http:\/\/ch.jfdi.cc\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/russia-jails-jehovah-s-witness-for-eight-years.jpg\")
A court in southwestern Russia has sentenced a Jehovah\u2019s Witness to eight years in prison after finding him guilty of organising \u201cextremist activities\u201d, according to a spokesman for the group.<\/p>\nA court in southwestern Russia has sentenced a Jehovah\u2019s Witness to eight years in prison after finding him guilty of organising \u201cextremist activities\u201d, according to a spokesman for the group.<\/p>\n
Russia\u2019s Supreme Court designated the Christian denomination as \u201cextremist\u201d in 2017<\/strong>, liquidating and banning its nearly 400 chapters across the country.Russia counted roughly 175,000 active believers at the time of the ban, according to the group\u2019s Russian website. Since then, raids, interrogations and jailings of adherents have occurred with some regularity.The case against Aleksandr Chagan, 52, was built around a \u201cmole\u201d who secretly filmed worship meetings held by videoconference<\/strong>, said the spokesman, Jarrod Lopes.Sentenced by a court in Tolyatti on Thursday, Chagan is the sixth Witness to receive eight years, the longest term imposed since the ban, Lopes said.Religious life in Russia is dominated by the Russian Orthodox Church, which is championed by and loyal to President Vladimir Putin.<\/strong> Some Orthodox scholars view Jehovah\u2019s Witnesses, known for door-to-door preaching and refusing military service, as a \u201ctotalitarian sect\u201d.At least 794 Witnesses have been criminally charged in Russia for their faith, and 127 are currently serving prison sentences, Lopes said.Last month, four Witnesses in the same Russian region were handed seven-year\u00a0jail terms\u00a0in Samara, the same region as Chagan, while a female believer was sentenced in Tolyatti to two years\u2019 forced labour.The European Court of Human Rights, the court of the Council of Europe, ruled in June 2022 that the ban was illegal<\/strong>, three months after the Council expelled Russia over its full-scale invasion of\u00a0Ukraine.Follow the A court in southwestern Russia sentenced a Jehovah\u2019s Witness, Aleksandr Chagan, to eight years in prison for organizing “extremist activities”. Russia’s Supreme Court had previously designated the Christian denomination as “extremist” in 2017, leading to the liquidation and banning of its nearly 400 chapters across the country. At the time of the ban, there were about 175,000 active believers in Russia. The case against Chagan was built around evidence from a “mole” who secretly filmed worship meetings. Chagan is the sixth Witness to receive an eight-year sentence, the longest term imposed since the ban. The Russian Orthodox Church dominates religious life in Russia, and some Orthodox scholars view Jehovah\u2019s Witnesses as a “totalitarian sect”. Currently, at least 794 Witnesses have been criminally charged in Russia for their faith, with 127 serving prison sentences. The European Court of Human Rights ruled in June 2022 that the ban on Jehovah\u2019s Witnesses was illegal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":3446,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"Default","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[233,932,3,201,250,115,839,411,131,154,19,168,17,18],"class_list":["post-3445","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cyprus","tag-church","tag-court","tag-cyprus","tag-europe","tag-google","tag-human-rights","tag-labour","tag-military-service","tag-prison","tag-putin","tag-russia","tag-supreme-court","tag-ukraine","tag-world"],"acf":{"keyphrase":"","keywords":"","sourceimg":"","country-category":""},"yoast_head":"\n
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