Russia to liquidate Jehovah's Witnesses' organization

by processor 52 Replies latest watchtower scandals

• 

  OrphanCrow

  Well, that didn't take long.

  According to the ECHR, there were "6" judgments handed down in 2016 for cases that involved the Jehovah's Witnesses. *oops - edit - hang on...I just did a search for "jehovah" but haven't checked the case details...that may be a wrong number)

  That is nowhere near the number you had stated, Fisherman:

  WT claims around 223 -to be exact.

  The ECHR claims 6. To be exact.

  You had said:

  Winning hundreds of cases in 2016 alone in the ECHR ! --the WT will also win this case

  Can you back this number up with sources, Fisherman? Or is this just a rumor that floats around in WT land?
  

  *edit to add - it looks like "jehovah" used for a search term showed up cases where it was a reference in another case. There actually is only one case that the Jehovah's Witnesses won - the one in Turkey

  One ECHR case won in 2016.

  Please correct me if I have made another mistake...
  
  
• 

  OrphanCrow

  kpop: I'm sorry but I must side with Russia on this because they see the JW for what it is- a cult, not a normal religion and for that Russia is 100% right. This has nothing to do with free speech and everything to do with stopping cults not stopping religion or free speech because cults are damaging to families and communities!

  The blood transfusion ban is a critical point that Russia uses to define the JWs as "extremist":

  http://forum18.org/archive.php?article_id=2197
  

  Other prohibited aims are more specific, including "the encouragement of suicide or the refusal on religious grounds of medical assistance to persons in a life- or health-endangering condition" and "the motivation of citizens to refuse to fulfil their civic duties as established by law and to commit other illegal acts" (see F18News 4 July 2016 http://www.forum18.org/archive.php?article_id=2195).

  
  These accusations have been made against Jehovah's Witness communities in suits to have them liquidated as "extremist" (alongside more specific allegations of distribution of "extremist" literature), based on their refusal of blood transfusions and conscientious objection to military service (see eg. F18News 24 May 2016 http://www.forum18.org/archive.php?article_id=2181).

  I will look for the case in Russia (it is somewhere on the Forum18 website) where a couple had ate poisonous mushrooms and the only anitdote was a blood transfusion. The man accepted one but the JW wife refused. The congregation rallied around her intially, a JW lawyer got involved, made a stink about her getting a "bloodless" treatment, the hospital acquiesced to the WT lawyer's demands and agreed to transfer her to another hospital, but nobody from the congregation showed up to take the woman to the other hospital for treatment and they never heard from the lawyer again. The JW woman and the staff waited...and then at the very last, the JW woman accepted blood. It was too late. She died.
• 

  OrphanCrow

  schnell: Is there a more credible source for this news than something like "star connect media"?

  From Forum18 May 2016:

  RUSSIA: Jehovah's Witnesses face possible liquidation

  *edit to add more info about the ECHR:

  http://www.forum18.org/archive.php?article_id=1724
  

  European Court of Human Rights
  While very slow, one possibility for redress against misapplication of the 2002 Extremism Law is the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. In June 2010 Jehovah's Witnesses lodged a complaint with the European Court over Russia's upholding of the Rostov regional ban on 34 Jehovah's Witness titles and their Taganrog community (Application No. 32401/10). By March 2012, Jehovah's Witnesses had submitted a further 13 applications to the European Court centring on numerous "counter-extremism" actions by the Russian state, including raids, prosecutions and bans on literature. The Court has yet to declare these cases admissible, and if it does it will be some years before they are heard.
• 

  kpop

  Thank you OrphanCrow! Yes now only if they can really ban the JW cult around the world!
  
• 

  Richard Oliver

  It is confirmed that Russia Supreme Court has ruled that Watchtower in Russia cannot appeal this warning by the prosecutor to liquidate the Administrative Offices. It was posted on jw broadcasting that the court ruled on this. That does not mean that it is liquidated or in the process but that the prosecutor can bring this before a court and if the court agrees the liquidation can go forward. It is not the banning of witnesses but it is that the congregations that have been prosecuted have lost their property and the administrative offices will also probably lose their property as well.
• 

  OrphanCrow

  
  

  Even Stalin could not eliminate Jehovah's Witnesses

  JEHOVAH AND THE PROSECUTOR. HOW THE STATE COMBATS A SECT
  

  Representative of organization says the actions of government confirm prophecy by Jesus Christ

  by Anton Bykov

  Open Russia, 17 January 2017

  The Jehovah's Witnesses—one of the largest religious organizations in the world—may be banned in Russia because of the distribution of extremist literature. In several cities adherents of this organization have already found themselves outside the law. Law enforcement agencies have pursued Jehovists for several years, and after the adoption of the antiextremist law in the country several regional congregations have been liquidated and witnesses have been subjected to criminal prosecution. However in the past year the prosecutor general began a decisive attack on Jehovah's Witnesses, threatening to enter the organizations into the list of extremists. In that case, all of its branches will be closed and the Jehovists themselves, who number in Russia about 100,000, will be deprived of the possibility of openly professing their religious views.
  
  On Monday, 16 January, a Moscow city court declined to satisfy an appeal filed by Jehovah's Witnesses against the action of the prosecutor general's office. Thereby the decision of a lower instance, which earlier had recognized as legal the warning about the impermissibility of committing extremist activity issued by the prosecutor's office against the Administrative Center of Jehovah's Witnesses, remained in force.

  *read full article at link - good background information

  more here: National Jehovah's Witnesses center rebuffed in court
• 

  darkspilver

  Update on the court case from JW Broadcasting:
  

  https://tv.jw.org/#en/video/VODOurOrganization/pub-jwb_201701_14_VIDEO
  
• 

  TheFadingAlbatros

  What will happen next in Russia ? Who may meet with strong rebuff, persecutions and restrictions ? The seven hypocrite JW. Org GB members well located and sustained in their US Ivory Watchtower ? Surely not a single one of them !!!!!!!¨¨
  
• 

  DJS

  I agree in principle with Nicolau. Having said that, religious divisiveness has been the primary cause of bloodshed, class distinction, gender, racial, orientation and cultural discrimination for thousands of years. Religions have been very slow to evolve because of the very reason the Russian anti-extremist laws were developed: Most religions think, teach and act that they are the only true religion, and they have, for thousands of years, been behind the chaos that is humanity. Russian laws seek to move that evolutionary process up. A lot.

  The Dubs would not be in this situation of the DarkLords had immediately, in 2002 and especially in 2007, removed all literature that violated the law from their homes, KHs and that they distributed and stopped preaching that they alone were the only true religion and all others would soon be destroyed. The old men in Brooklyn were delusional and arrogant in thinking they could skirt the laws.
  

  There isn't anything wrong with the laws. Draconian methods to enforce them will ultimately prove counter productive. But I don't think Vlad and his Impalers will get into that trap. They will take the stance that the Dubs are free to practice their religion as long as it follows law. And if the Dubs do get banned, the likely route for removing the ban is to completely disavow Precious - that they are alone in getting god's favor, communication, and that they alone will survive the End Time and all other religions and the world itself is under Satan's control. Gollum followed Frodo's bitten off finger and the Ring into the Fires of Mordor rather than relinquish Precious. Do any of us think the DarkLords will not do likewise? To disavow Precious will set a precedent that will be used in all other countries.
  

  Yes, what a fine pickle the DarkLords are in. Between a rock and a hard place, the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea.
  

  And that is most excellent.
  

  Vlad and his Impalers won't likely kill anyone, and they will avoid prison sentences. They will put missionaries and other dubs who weren't born there on the next boat back from where they came, fine individual dubs and middle level dubs for violations and as noted take ownership of select physical assets.
  

  All the cards are held by Vlad and his Impalers. Do not weep for the DarkLords or the DarkTower. Their arrogance caused all of this.
  
• 

  Vidiot

  darkspilver - "Update on the court case from JW Broadcasting..."

  Other than this, I'm not hearing much about it from the local JWs...

  

  ...maybe the Org doesn't own a whole lot of property in Russia.