PROSECUTOR IN EKATERINBURG SEIZED JEWISH SCRIPTURES TO CHECK FOR EXTREMISM
The prosecutor's office of the Kirov district of Ekaterinburg confiscated at the end of May the books of the Tanakh (Old Testament) including the Torah (Pentateuch of Moses) as well as the books of the Prophets and the Writings, in order to study them to find "the existence in these books of materials of extremist contents." As one of the activists of the Jewish community of the city, who asked that his name not be used, told the Israeli Internet publication Kursor, the seizure of the books happened in the library of the Jewish day school [gymnasium] Ohr-Avner.
About a year ago the day school of the Ekaterinburg Jewish community center was already under threat of closing. According to a report on the Urals website Pravdaurfo, an inspection conducted by specialists of the Rospotrebnadzor [Russian Consumer Protection] and prosecutor's office, along with experts of the federal Ministry of Justice, discovered dozens of gross violations: from problems with conformity of the school curriculum to the state standards in education to spider webs in the cafeteria and food in boxes with waste.
Each agency compiled its own list of faults, each of which ran to more than ten pages.
Officials have also tried to obtain from the day school through the courts more than 40 million rubles, but the administrators of the community insist that they have the right to use of the building without charge. (tr. by PDS, posted 2 June 2015)
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