In Kursk, a Court Sentenced Five Believers. Four of Them, Including a Woman, Were Assigned From 2 to 4.5 Years in Prison

On June 3, 2021, the Kursk Industrial District Court sentenced 5 Jehovah's Witnesses for their religion. Andrey Andreev was sentenced to 4.5 years in a colony, Andrey Ryshkov in the form of 3 years in a colony, Artem Bagratyan in the form of 2.5 years in a colony, his wife, Alevtina, in the form of 2 years in a colony. Their co-religionist Alexandr Vospitanyuk was given a 2-year suspended sentence.

The decision was made by judge Oksana Ivanova. Andrey Andreev was found guilty of organizing the activities of an extremist organization (part 1 of article 282.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), the others were found guilty of participation in it (part 2 of article 282.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). Andreev, Ryshkov and Artem Bagratyan remain in jail, and Alevtina Bagratyan, who has actually served her sentence in jail and under house arrest, will continue to wait for the verdict to come into force at home with a tracking bracelet on her leg.

The verdict has not entered into force and can be appealed. Believers insist on their complete innocence. There is not a single victim in the case. The prosecutor asked the court to impose even harsher punishment on them: for Andrey Andreev - 7.5 years in prison, for Andrey Ryshkov - 4.5 years, for Alevtina Bagratyan - 4 years, for Artem Bagratyan - 3.5 years and the same was for Aleksandr Vospitaniuk.

Artem Bagratyan suffers from diabetes mellitus and other chronic diseases, his condition requires inpatient treatment. In 2019, an ambulance was called for him right during one of the meetings. In the Kursk pre-trial detention centre, his condition worsened to critical, but the management and doctors of the isolation ward for a long time denied him proper treatment and the necessary diet, after which he was hospitalized. Alevtina Bagratyan has an elderly mother who needs her help.

All five believers were imprisoned immediately after being detained in 2019 and 2020. Aleksandr Vospitanyuk, a father of 3 children, left the IVS 2 days after the arrest, Alevtina Bagratyan was transferred from the detention centre to house arrest a year and 2 months later. Andrey Ryshkov has already spent more than a year in a pre-trial detention centre, and Andrey Andreev and Artem Bagratyan have spent more than a year and a half.

The case against five Kursk believers was initiated on September 12, 2019, and was investigated by the FSB of Russia in the Kursk region for 11 months. On August 11, 2020, the case materials were transferred for consideration to the Industrial District Court of Kursk. The case was heard for about 10 months.

During the court proceedings, it became known that a certain A. Grisko, pretending to be interested in the Bible, kept a record of conversations with Alevtina and transmitted information to the FSB officers. Several witnesses in court retracted their earlier testimonies, explaining that the investigation put pressure on them, and information appeared in the protocols that they did not report. The defence also drew attention to the falsifications in the case materials.

Throughout the trial, the prosecution argued that all the defendants profess the religion of Jehovah's Witnesses, and their faith in God is "a continuation of the activities of an extremist organization." However, believers have never hidden their religion, and no religion is banned in Russia.

The groundlessness of the persecution of Jehovah's Witnesses based on religion has been repeatedly emphasized by Russian and foreign experts. Historian Alexandr Guryanov, during a recent round table dedicated to the 70th anniversary of the deportation of Jehovah's Witnesses to Siberia, noted: "There is some particular bitterness on the part of the government towards this particular confession."