CASE AGAINST HEAD OF JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES SOCIETY DISMISSED IN ASTANA
Radio Azattyk, 17 October 2017
Today in the specialized district administrative court of Astana, proceedings in the case of possession of literature "containing signs of inciting strife" against the leader of the Christian Society of Jehovah's Witnesses of the city of Astana, Dmitry Bukin, were halted. Judge Kanat Imanaliev also issued a partial decision regarding the Office of Religious Affairs of Astana, Bukin's attorney, Natalia Kononenko, says.
She said that the judge read only the operative portion of the decision and therefore the details will be known after receiving its text.
"On what basis—for lack of evidence of a crime on the basis of part 4 of article 453 or for procedural violations such as statute of limitations or improper composition of the indictment—we do not understand. It will be possible to state specifically after receiving the decision," Natalia Kononenko says.
The reason for the proceedings in the court was an indictment on an administrative violation of law that was composed by the chief specialist, a lawyer of the Office for Religious Affairs of Astana, Almazbek Mambetov. During a search in January of this year in the premises of the Christian Society of Jehovah's Witnesses, 15 religious books were seized with such titles as "What does the Bible Really Teach?," "Humanity in Search of God," "Is it Necessary to Believe in the Trinity?" and others. In the opinion of the lawyer of the Office for Religious Affairs of Astana, Almazbek Mambetov, these publications "contain signs of the creation of religious conflict that represent the propaganda of inciting religious hostility or strife along with the propaganda of the exceptionality and superiority of citizens on the basis of indicators of their attitude toward the religious organization of Jehovah's Witnesses."
This search in January was conducted within the framework of the investigation of the criminal case on a charge of inciting religious strife of 61-year-old Teimur Akhmedov, an adherent of this religious denomination. In May of this year, Akhmedov was sentenced to five years in prison.
According to attorney Konstantin Chernichenko, on 25 August of this year, an opinion of the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights was adopted, which "established in the case of Akhmedov the absence of an incident of inciting religious strife, the illegality of the criminal prosecution of Akhmedov, and consequently the illegality of all procedural actions that had been conducted within the framework of this investigation." (tr. by PDS, posted 19 October 2017)
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