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Andrew Okhotin, a Baptist youth pastor, flew from New York to Moscow in late March on a joyful mission. He was going to deliver a $48,000 cash gift from American believers to Russian Baptists, visit for a few days with relatives and then return to the United States and his studies at Harvard Divinity School.
Nearly three months later, Okhotin, 28, is still in Moscow, has yet to hand over the money and, if Moscow prosecutors get their way, could spend five years in a Russian prison.
Russian customs inspectors claim Okhotin is a currency smuggler. On March 29, they allege, he deliberately chose the "nothing to declare" corridor at Moscow's main airport, all the while carrying $48,000 in $50 and $100 bills in his backpack.
Okhotin says he made an innocent mistake by stepping into the wrong corridor.
He was detained and, when customs inspectors discovered how much money he was carrying, interrogated for hours. He said his questioners offered to release him for bribes of $5,000 or $10,000.
As the marathon session wore on without agreement, customs officer Irina Kondratskaya jotted down her home telephone number and the cell phone number of a Moscow lawyer, saying, "Contact him, he'll tell you what to do," Okhotin recalls. The lawyer, Okhotin says, offered to get the charges dropped for $15,000.
The lawyer denies it.
Kondratskaya also denies any wrongdoing. "If Mr. Okhotin is accusing me of bribery, let him talk to my supervisors," she said.
Whatever the facts, Okhotin's case has provoked the indignation of evangelical Christians worldwide.
Supporters are following his journey through the Russian legal system and his 27-day hunger strike and holding prayer appeals on Christian-oriented radio and Web sites.
Okhotin's father was a Soviet-era pastor in an underground Baptist church who spent 2 1/2 years in prison.
The family -- Andrew Okhotin, his parents and his eight siblings -- emigrated to the United States in 1989, settling in San Diego.
Rep. Joseph Pitts (R-Pa.) has been following the case, and has enlisted the help of five fellow congressmen in appealing to Russian President Vladimir Putin for Okhotin's release.
Meantime, Okhotin's supporters have held prayer vigils outside the Russian Embassy in Washington and students at Harvard Divinity School have fasted and taken part in a 12-hour prayer service for Okhotin.
The Russian government has not officially responded to the lobbying and petitions aside from a terse June 10 news release from the Foreign Ministry announcing that Okhotin had been detained at the airport for not declaring the $48,000.
According to Okhotin's Moscow lawyer, Russian officials are increasingly
irritated at the volume of faxes and missives being received on Okhotin's
behalf. (Copyright 2003 The Times Mirror Company, posted 21 June 2003)
AN AMERICAN, $ 48,000 AND CUSTOMS
by Nabi Abdullaev
Moscow Times, 20 June 2003
On a Saturday morning, Andrew Okhotin arrived at Sheremetyevo aboard a flight from New York with $ 48,000 and a properly filled-out customs declaration form in his pocket. The 28-year-old U.S. citizen crossed the white line into the green corridor for passengers who have nothing to declare. What happened next will be left up to a court to decide next month.
Okhotin, a Baptist missionary, says customs officials threatened him and tried to extract a hefty bribe. Customs says it caught him red-handed trying to smuggle in money.
Okhotin, who was charged Monday with smuggling, faces up to five years in prison if convicted. The case has sparked an uproar in U.S. religious circles, and Okhotin has become the subject of many a prayer vigil. Several members of Congress have signed an appeal to President Vladimir Putin. And the Baptist-affiliated Russian Evangelistic Ministries, a San Diego-based nonprofit group founded by Okhotin's father, a former Soviet religious dissident who emigrated to the United States in 1989, has fired off letters to senior U.S. and Russian officials.
The bitter irony of the dispute is Okhotin never would have run into trouble if he had chosen the red corridor, where customs officials would have stamped his declaration and waved him on his way.
Okhotin apparently knew that quite well. He had made the trip before with large sums of cash, and on each visit when he had tried to go through the green corridor he was redirected to the red corridor.
But for some reason Okhotin headed for the green corridor again when he arrived with the $48,000 on March 29.
"I was told by a stewardess in the plane that I actually don't have to declare the money I bring into Russia if I don't intend to take it out of the country, but I filled out the declaration form, just in case anybody asked me about it," Okhotin, looking gaunt after a 27-day hunger strike, said in an interview this week.
"I took the green corridor, as I had done earlier when coming to Russia. If they had told me that this wasn't allowed, I would have gone through the red corridor," he said.
The $48,000 was from donations collected by members of the Russian Evangelistic Ministries and intended for the work of Baptist believers in Russia, said Okhotin, a Harvard student.
A customs official stopped Okhotin and asked whether he was carrying any money and had a declaration form. Okhotin said he replied yes to both questions.
Asked to show the money and declaration, Okhotin complied. He said he also produced a letter from the donors, explaining the origins of the money and its intended purpose.
Instead of redirecting him to the red corridor, however, customs officials detained him, confiscated the money and subjected him to an "intense" 12-hour interrogation, Okhotin said.
"I was not given any food or drink during this time," he said. "Also, they threatened to jail me." He said a customs investigator, Irina Kondratskaya, told him he had two options: be jailed immediately or pay $ 10,000 and walk free.
"She said that if I didn't pay now, she would take my case to prosecutors and that they would open a criminal case against me," Okhotin said. "I refused to pay, and she, thinking that I misunderstood her offer, told me to discuss it with my brother David, who lives in Moscow." A call to his brother did not resolve the issue.
Several hours later, Okhotin said, Kondratskaya offered to let him go for $ 5,000. He refused again.
At about midnight, Kondratskaya agreed to let Okhotin go home with his brother, who had arrived at the airport in the meantime, on condition that he sign a promise not to leave Moscow.
Okhotin said he refused because Kondratskaya would not give him a document showing customs had confiscated the money. "I told her, 'If you are going to seize the money, you can hold me as well,'" he said.
However, after talking by telephone with his parents in California and U.S. Embassy officials, he agreed to leave.
Kondratskaya denied any wrongdoing Thursday.
"I found that Okhotin had violated the law with his actions at customs and, by law, I had to detain him for two days or release him on bail," she said in a telephone interview.
She said she had not asked for a bribe and had generously let Okhotin go without posting bail.
"It's absurd that I would offer to close his case, because several non-customs officials had already signed reports about the matter," Kondratskaya said. "Internal affairs would have immediately found out about it and held me responsible." She also said she had offered Okhotin a document showing customs had confiscated the money.
Okhotin said Kondratskaya gave him the telephone number of a Moscow lawyer, Igor Tokarev, while he was being questioned.
Kondratskaya said that under the law she has to give a suspect access to a lawyer and that she provided Okhotin with the first name she came across in her files.
Okhotin said he received a call from the lawyer three days later.
"He told me that for $ 15,000 the criminal case against me could be closed and the money returned," Okhotin said. "He told me that the papers in my case would be rewritten and the incriminating parts removed." Reached by telephone Thursday, Tokarev said he could not recall ever speaking with Okhotin and said he never would have made such an offer.
The police took over the investigation in mid-April, and Okhotin went on the hunger strike May 21.
Part of the reason the investigation dragged on was because the police had trouble finding witnesses who could testify that Okhotin had refused to show his declaration form, Okhotin said. He said police investigator Olga Pugachyova all but decided to close the case for lack of evidence last week.
However, Okhotin said Pugachyova told him that she was forced to complete the investigation after coming under pressure from Moscow prosecutor Viktor Kozlov.
Pugachyova refused to discuss the case Thursday. Kozlov could not be reached for comment this week.
The Foreign Ministry released a statement last week saying that Okhotin had broken the law and would be prosecuted.
When Okhotin was charged Monday, he ended his hunger strike. He said he lost 15 kilograms.
Okhotin said he is worried about the trial and fears he might be the victim of religious persecution.
"I have no hope of a fair trial," he said. "There is no guarantee that the judge won't be ordered to convict me against all logic and the law." His lawyer, Anatoly Pchelintsev, said the case was the unfortunate result of an attempted shakedown at customs.
"The case is not political or religious," he said. "It is just the story of a shakedown that turned public. All of the officials involved are now doing their best to save face by helping convict my client.
He said, however, that the case is lacking a key component: Investigators have failed to prove that his client deliberately attempted to smuggle in the money.
"Under the law, Okhotin at most should walk free after paying a fine for his negligence," he said.
He said the police would send the results of their investigation to prosecutors on Friday or Monday and the case should go to court in early July. (Copyright 2003 Independent Press, posted 21 June 2003)
Russia
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The initiative of the Committee on Affairs of Public Associations and Religious Organizations of the State Duma permitted state workers, scholars, legislators, and representatives of religious organiztions to meet in the building on Okhotny Riad in order to discuss critical problems of church-state relations, and in particular to discuss suggestions for introducing amendments into the current law of RF "On freedom of conscience and religious associations."
The opening report at the seminar was delivered by the chairman of the committee, Viktor Zorkaltsev. Andrew Sebentsov, the vice chairman of the Commission on Questions of Religious Associatians of the government of the Russian federation expressed in his speech disagreement with Zorkaltsev's suggestion for the creation of a code on religion on the basis that it would produce extreme interference in the religious sphere. He also thinks that religious education and enlightenment is the business of religious organizations and not the government. Sebentsov described the work of the group that he heads in the governmental commission which is engaged in preparing suggestions for introducing amendments into the 1997 law. The group has been working since October 2001 and at the present time meets once a week or every two weeks. During his speech Sebentsov expressed the following ideas: it is necessary to maintain the compromise of the 1997 law that was expressed in the preamble. There exists a question about the volume of legislation: controlling the implementation of freedom of conscience and religious confession should be done only at the federal level, but the implementation is at the local level. Since at the present time the executive branch does not have any stimulus for transferring property of religious signification to religious organizations, it is necessary to introduce into law a guiding principle regarding transfer of such property for either ownership or free use, including the land under houses of worship, of not only old but also new construction.
There also exists a problem of definition of concepts: at the present time "religious associations" includes "religious organizations" and "religious groups." It is necessary to have a more general definition that is of the nature of an open list. Any religious group should have the opportunity to be registered and to become a legal entity, because the requirement for a fifteen-year period of existence for religious groups, which the law demands for registration, signifies the absence of supervision of their activity during this period. It is proposed to introduce amendments according to which the fifteen-year existence requirement for the registration of local religious organizations establishes the right of registering a centralized organization only. In addition, it would be beneficial to increase the number of local organizations for the registration of a centralized organization. For example, it is possible to proceed on the rule that when ten citizens have the right to register a local organization, then ten local organizations can register a centralized one. Because for now there occur disputes and conflicts within the "ten" who constitute the core of a religious organization, this requires an annual designation of the composition of this "ten."
It is necessary to expand the competence of expert analyses by religion experts, that now applies only to the period of registration, and to specify the rules about such analyses and to express this in law. Also important is the rule pertaining to the naming of a religious organization so that there will not be any deception relative to its confessional character.
There is a suggestion to require foreigners who conduct professional religious activity in RF to obtain a worker's visa. It is also essential to correct the situation where supervision over the activity of religious organizations is entrusted to agencies of justice, but at the same time there does not exist a real instrument for such supervision. In conclusion, Sebentsov reported that the final results of the activity of the working group should be expected in six months.
In his speech, which was, as always, lively, Rabbi Zinovy Kogan, president of the Congress of Jewish Religious Organizations and Communities of Russia (KEROOR), dwelt on several problems of the life of Jewish communities, but he placed the main emphasis on patriotism. In his opinion, a traditional religion is a religion that trains defenders of the fatherland. "I dream about a rabbi officer," he acknowledged, noting that it is not necessary to talk about the privileges of confessions but about their cooperation with the state in the area of charitable and social service.
Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin, vice chairman of the Department of External Church Relations of the Moscow patriarchate, expressed his opinion that the 1997 law is a good basic law, although it is not perfect. He noted the achievement at the present time of a high level of mutual understanding between the state and religious organizations, so that today only "fine tuning" is needed. This adjustment has been worked out on many matters such as taxes, taxpayer identification numbers, and return of property. The question of land is especially important. The representative of RPTs expressed the hope that by 1 January 2004 this question will be resolved and religious organizations will receive the land they need for free use. Father Vsevolod opposed the idea of registering religious groups that would give them the status of legal entities, and he called in general for the preparation of amendments in existing law that heed the "voice of the people." In his opinion, the basic right--the equality of religious organizations before the law--does not preclude the possibility of granting special status to some religious organizations that would express the special relationship of society toward them, because equality does not rule out distinctions. As in many countries of Europe, in Russia it is possible to establish a certain gradation of the status of religious organizations, several of which will receive public and/or state support. Fr Vsevolod also called attention to the fact that the sphere of religion is, in essence, greater than the sphere of the activity of religious organizations. It pertains to the selection of world view and of more self-identification. Thus religion has influence, and it should have influence, on the life of society--on the news media, public morality, and even on the making of political decisions. In his opinion, this religious influence should be expressed in law.
The address by Archbishop Evgeny of Verey, the chairman of the Educational Committee of RPTs and rector of the Moscow Ecclesiastical Academy, was devoted to the topic of the integration of religious education into the Russian educational system. His main idea was that it is necessary to create a single educational space, which would include religious education, too, and thereby would guarantee equal conditions for state and confessional educational institutions. For this it is necessary to establish state licensing of religious educational institutions in accordance with the state standards of general academic disciplines and to provide for them methodological help, cooperation in training of teaching personnel, and recognizing the academic degrees they grant, etc. On the whole, the position of the head of the Educational Committee of the Russian Orthodox church coincided with the vision on the matter that was expressed in the report of February of 2003 by three presidential envoys, in the Central, Volga, and Southern federal districts, that was sent to the president of the Russian federation as a concluding document of a academic, procedural conference on "Mutual relations of the state and religious associations in the sphere of education," which was conducted by them jointly with state and religious organizations on 10-11 October 2002.
Developing what had been said by Archbishop Evgeny, Marina Belogubova, the head of the Department for Work with Public and Religious Associations of the staff of the presidential envoy in the Central federal district, expressed in her speech concern that there is no mention or definition of "religious education" in either the 1992 law on education or in the draft of the code on education. In her opinion, it is necessary that religious organizations actively participate in the legislative process pertaining to education.
Archpriest Vladimir Vorobiev, rector of the St. Tikhon's Orthodox Theological Institute of Moscow, who has participated directly in the development of the state standards of a "theology" specialty in secular educational institutions, dwelt on problems of religious and theological education. In his opinion, it is obvious that at the present time religious education is being set off against atheist education, whereas religious and secular education do not contradict one another. He noted that even the original--"atheist"--standard on "theology" of 1993 permitted the opening of a theology department in Omsk and granting accreditation to the St. Tikhon's institute, and he also told how work was conducted on developing and adopting the current standard, accepted in 2002, and he reported on currently operating faculties, departments, and chairs of theology in various secular educational institutions of Russia, not only Orthodox ones, but also Muslim and Jewish educational structures. Fr Vladimir also expressed the opinion that other state standards of disciplines of the humanities should be corrected and supplemented in order to make them compatible with a religious world view so that a final end to atheist education would be made in our country.
Igor Ponkin, a teacher of the department of state construction and law and director of the Institute of State-Confessional Relations and Law (a web site) told in his address to the seminar about the legal standards that pertain to religious education in Europe and America, especially dwelling on the concept of "secularity" (a second edition of his book devoted to this subject will come out in the near future).
A member of the State Duma Committee on Affairs of Public Associations and Religious Orgnizations, Alexander Chuev, dwelt on several problems that religious organizations have confronted: transfer of property and land, relations with museums, etc. In his opinion, legislation is needed to define the status of traditional religious organizations as well as directing the social partnership of the state and confessions, the chief of which would be charity, education, and presence in the news media. Chuev spoke in favor of "spiritual protectionism of the state" with regard to believers. He also thinks that it would be beneficial to adopt a code on religion.
Judicial counsel of the Moscow patriarchate Viktor Kalinin thinks that the relations between state and religious organiztions should be determine by a triad of principles: (1) law, (2) recognition of the internal structures of religious organizations, and (3) developing practice.
The seminar also was addressed by representatives of academic science, the well known specialists Olga Vasilieva, head of the department of religious studies of the Russian Academy, and Miran Mchedlov, director of the Research Center "Religion in contemporary society", as well as Alexander Zhuravsky, director of the Center of Ethnoreligious and Political Studies of the department of religious studies of the Russian Academy, and chief editor of the board of religious studies of the Great Russian Encyclopedia.
It is necessary to note with regret that the voice of representatives of Russian Muslims was not heard at the seminar conference, and that of the numerous representatives of governmental authority in the provinces who are responsible for relations with religious organizations, only five persons were able to speak: A.M. Magomedov (Dagestan), Yu.T. Sadchenko (Volgograd), S.I. Ilinsky (Udmurtiia), N.S. Volkov (republic of Khakassiia, and I.D. Gurov (Kaliningrad). About the problems with which representatives of the executive and legislative branches in the province are faced we will write in another article. (tr. by PDS, posted 21 June 2003)
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The editorial board of the weekly "Bereg" that is published in Voronezh, which was founded by the city's mayor, called the chief rabbi of Voronezh, Nosson Vershubsky (KEROOR) and the leadership of the Jewish community of the city "to restrain your fellow countryman," a journalist of another Voronezh weekly, "Moe!" Leonid Shifrin. In the opinion of the editors of "Bereg," in giving much attention to the theme of Orthodoxy L. Shifrin offended the feelings of Orthodox believers with his article "A cross was erected in our city."
The article was devoted to the setting up of four eight-pointed crosses at the entrances to Voronezh in April of this year on the occasion of the Day of Slavic Literature and Culture. These crosses frightened citizens and evoked in them associations with cemeteries, as Shifrin described in his article. The article was considered to be offensive to the feelings of believers not only by the editors of "Bereg," but also be the leadership of the Voronezh diocese, which had earlier spoken out against materials in the "Moe!" weekly that criticized the diocesan administration. In May of this year Metropolitan Mefody Nemtsov, shortly before his departure from the Voronezh see, even declared that reading the "Moe!" weekly was a "sinful occupation." (tr. by PDS, posted 19 June 2003)
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The Russian Orthodox church rejects the attempts of Tatarstan President Mintimer Shaimiev to force a dialogue between the Moscow patriarchate and the Vatican. "The dialogue between the Russian Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches does not need mediators. This has been stated many times by the hierarchy of the Moscow patriarchate," the vice chairman of the Department of External Church Relations of the Moscow patriarchate, Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin, stated today to Interfax.
As previously reported, today the head of Tatarstan expressed regret in an interview with Interfax that the visit by Roman Pope John Paul II to Russia has encountered certain difficulties. "Some people in Russia do not want a visit by the Roman pope to Russia and, in particular, to Kazan," M. Shaimiev said, adding that "nevertheless it will sometime be necessary to begin a dialogue of the two churches," and "to resolve the problems that have grown up, the sooner the better."
In this regard Vsevolod Chaplin noted that the "Russian church is in constant contact with the Vatican, but the impediment to a meeting at the level of the primates of the two churches is not some imagined lack of desire to conduct a dialogue but the presence of genuine problems that were created by the actions of many Catholic leaders and structures."
"The dialogue should really be conducted for resolving real problems," the represntative of RPTs said, "although for now it turns out that under the pretense of conversations about dialogue, the Vatican is continuing its expansion which causes harm to the interests of the Russian church and offends its believers."
The vice chairman of OVTsSMP explained that he was talking about attempts to organize Greek Catholic parishes in places where they never had been and, missionary activity among people who had been baptized into Orthodoxy, and about the abject position of believers of the Russian church in western Ukraine. (tr. by PDS, posted 19 June 2003)
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Kazakhstan continues to carry out an initiative directed to the maintenance of interconfessional and interethnic harmony in the country and in the world. As "Interfax" reports, the head of the republic, Nursyltan Nazarbaev, said this today at a meeting with the president of the World Jewish Congress, Israel Singer.
Mr. Singer told reporters after the conclusion of conversations that Nazarbaev stressed in the conversation with him that Kazakhstan always has acted as the initiator in the establishment of mutual understanding among countries and peoples in such matters as religious tolerance, openness, and the facilitating of the establishment of a better world order. "We Jews give great significance to this and we find that the discussion of these problems is very, very important," Mr. Singer noted.
In addition, the head of the Jewish congress reported that during the past two weeks, in addition to conversations with Nazarbaev, he has held a meeting with Roman Pope John Paul II and the head of the Constantinople Orthodox church, Patriarch Bartholomew, during which they discussed the reasons for the growth of misunderstanding among representatives of various religions. Mr. Singer said these meetings permitted him to understand that it is necessary not only to discuss and analyze the causes of interconfessional conflict but also to take measures leading to understanding and trust among people of various confessions.
In connection with this the head of WJC noted that during his meeting with Mr. Nazarbaev they discussed the initiative of the head of Kazakhstan for holding a forum in Astana in September 2003 of leaders of the influential religions of the world. He also noted that WJC, as well as the Eurasian Congress of Jews, will take part in the planned forum. "We will try to secure the participation of Jews in the conference an a par with Muslims and Christians," he reported.
In Kazakhstan, with a population of more than 14.8 million people, there live representatives of more than 100 nations and nationalities professing various religions. (tr. by PDS, posted 19 June 2003)
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After the issuance of the sentence of three months in prison confinement for the priest Vasily Mkalavishvili, who was excommunicated from the Georgian Orthodox church and transferred to the jurisdiction of the Old-Style Greeks, his attorney, Kartlos Garibashvili, declared that the prosecutor Valery Grigalashvili, who represented the state in court on 17 June, is a member of the Jehovah's Witnesses sect, "Blagovest-info" reports. It is this religious organization that has been the main target of the "holy struggle" of the disgraced priest.
Kartlos Garibashvili also warned President Eduard Shevardnadze that if the search for Father Vasily, who is hiding from justice, is not called off he "will bring out twenty citizens for every policeman in order to defend the true patriarch of Georgia." According to the report of the "Asaval Dasavali" newspaper, the attorney for the unfrocked priest made yet another sensational statement, calling Patriarch Catholicos Ilia II "an agent of KGB who was appointed by the former first secretary of the Central Committee, Eduard Shevardnadze." (tr. by PDS, posted 19 June 2003)
Related article: "Attack on Georgian protestants"
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