JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES' PUBLICATIONS RULED EXTREMIST IN KURGAN
The prosecutor's office of Kurgan achieved through court the recognition as extremist of the book "Keep yourself in God's love" and the brochure "Let God's spirit influence you and not the world's spirit" by the international religious organization of Jehovah's Witnesses, the website of the provincial monitoring agency reports.
"In the course of judicial proceedings, lasting more than a year, with the goal of studying the semantic orientation of the text, linguistic and religious studies expert analyses were conducted. It was concluded that the ideas propounded by the authors of the books bear a clearly extremist character, since they aimed at arousing religious hatred and hostility with respect to people who are not members of the religious organization of Jehovah's Witnesses," the prosecutor's office noted.
After the court's decision takes effect, a copy of it will be delivered to the Ministry of Justice, which will include the texts in the list of extremist materials.
Representatives of Jehovah's Witnesses regularly have problems with the law in Russia. Thus, in January, a Kurgan court ruled brochures of the religious organization "How to achieve happiness in life," "In what may people hope?", "How to develop close relations with God," and "What is necessary to know about God and His intent" to be extremist. In late December 2013 it was reported that the leader of a Tobolsk group of this sect, who was accused of extremism and prohibiting blood transfusion, because of which one of the members almost died, was held criminally liable.
In 2004, a court in Moscow dissolved a congregation of Jehovah's Witnesses and prohibited its activity. The congregation was found guilty, specifically, of recruiting children, encouraging believers to break with their families, and encouraging suicide and rejection of medical care. (tr. by PDS, posted 4 September 2015)
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