TURKMENISTAN: Baptist prisoner of conscience moved, another Baptist still held, a third Protestant still denied family reunification

Baptist prisoner of conscience Vyacheslav Kalataevsky – who is on a three year labour camp sentence – has been moved to a harsher labour camp in Seydi, Forum 18 News Service has been told. The camp is 1,200 kms (750 miles) away from his family home, and the family were denied the opportunity to see him in transit by armed guards with machine guns. Another Baptist, Yevgeny Potolov, remains in jail six weeks after his arrest. The MSS secret police appear to be indicating that he may be deported for his religious activity, local Baptists told Forum 18. Meanwhile Wendy Lucas, a US citizen whose husband Merdan Shirmedov has been denied permission to leave Turkmenistan since January, told Forum 18 there is no progress in his case. Turkmen Ambassador to the USA Meret Orazov has not answered her questions and has refused to answer Forum 18's questions. The exit ban means that Shirmedov has not yet seen his first child, a girl, who was born in the USA on 18 May.

2 July 2007

TAJIKISTAN: "Antidemocratic" draft Religion Law

Tajikistan's latest draft of a proposed new Religion Law has been described to Forum 18 News Service by a Protestant source as "antidemocratic." Religious minorities and human rights activists fear it will be interpreted by officials as banning all unregistered religious activity. The proposed Law bars much legitimate peaceful religious activity, including actions directed at sharing beliefs. Religiously-affiliated political parties are banned, thus apparently banning the opposition Islamic Revival Party. Children younger than 7 are banned from receiving religious education, and young people are forbidden from being "members or participants of religious organisations." All religious education in private houses is forbidden. Only Tajik citizens can lead religious organisations, which causes great concern to the Catholic Church. The main issue concerning religious minorities is legal status, as the draft Law imposes absurdly stringent registration requirements and exceptionally high numbers of signatures to apply for legal status.

2 July 2007

TAJIKISTAN: Draft Religion Law causes "deep anxiety"

Tajikistan's religious minorities have expressed "deep anxiety" about the country's latest draft Religion Law, Forum 18 News Service has learnt. They fear the draft Law will make it almost impossible for any non-Muslim religious communities to gain legal status. The government is currently refusing to accept new legal status applications. A joint letter of concern to the Tajik President and parliament has been signed by 22 religious minorities, including the Baha'is, the Catholics, Baptists, Pentecostals, Adventists, Lutherans, and other Protestant denominations. Although the draft Law limits the number of mosques, the officially-backed Muslim leadership refuses to comment on the Law, referring all Forum 18's enquiries to the government. The OSCE is critical of the draft Law's "over-intensive state control on religion and religious activities" and is working with the government, civil society, and all religious organisations to enable a Law which will meet Tajikistan's international commitments.

28 June 2007

TURKEY: What chance for religious freedom in Turkey's elections?

Turkey is due to hold parliamentary elections on 22 July, which will have a crucial impact on the presidential election due in autumn. Both elections will strongly influence the chances of greater freedom of thought, conscience and belief, Otmar Oehring of the German Catholic charity Missio notes. Turkish religious minorities Forum 18 News Service has spoken to are highly concerned about the outcome of the elections. For, as Dr Oehring observes in this personal commentary for Forum 18, Turks who want to see genuine freedom of thought, conscience and religion have little expectation that either the parliamentary or presidential election will bring any improvement. No political party with any chance of gaining real power wants either to tackle the dangerous media intolerance of religious minorities or to take the dramatic changes necessary to usher in genuine religious freedom.

27 June 2007

UZBEKISTAN: Pentecostal and Jehovah's Witness prisoners of conscience face harsh labour camp conditions

Friends of Pentecostal prisoner of conscience Dmitry Shestakov, sentenced to four years in a labour camp, have told Forum 18 News Service of their concern at the conditions he is being held in. He has lost between 15 and 20 kilograms (33 to 44 pounds) in weight and is being pressured to renounce his faith. Former prisoners from Camp No. 29, where he is being held, describe unsanitary and dangerous living and working conditions, which cause a high level of sickness among prisoners. Guards beat them with truncheons and members of criminal gangs have a ruthless hold over other prisoners. Jehovah's Witness prisoner of conscience Irfon Khamidov has lost his appeal against a sentence of two years in a labour camp. Jehovah's Witnesses note irregularities in the legal process, including testimony from two people claimed by the authorities to be "victims" of Khamidov's "illegal" teaching, who testified at his original trial that they had never met him. The authorities have refused to speak to Forum 18 about the cases.

27 June 2007

RUSSIA: Said Nursi ban brands moderate Muslims as extremist

Muslims popularising the work of Said Nursi, a Turkish Muslim theologian, may be at risk of criminal prosecution as extremists, Forum 18 News Service has been told. If an appeal – which may be heard in August - against a Moscow court ban on translations of Nursi's works fails, "anyone in Russia who publishes or distributes the banned publications of Said Nursi will be liable to criminal prosecution," Valeri Kuzmin of Tatarstan's Public Prosecutor's Office told Forum 18. Sergei Sychev, a lawyer who is contesting the ban, estimates that millions of copies of Nursi's work Risale-i Nur - a popular missionary text – are currently in circulation in Russia. Kuzmin has stated that legal action was initiated in response to complaints from relatives "concerned by what was happening to those lured into the Nursi community." Its approximately 200 members in Tatarstan, Kuzmin estimated, "try to sever social ties" in just the same way as "totalitarian sects such as the Jehovah's Witnesses." The ban relies solely upon analysis of the work by psychologists and linguists of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Russia's Ombudsman for Human Rights, Vladimir Lukin, and a wide range of Russia's Muslim leaders and scholars has condemned the ban.

26 June 2007

UZBEKISTAN: Crackdown on Protestants continues

In the latest deportation for religious activity known to Forum 18 News Service, a Tajik Pentecostal who has lived in Uzbekistan for more than 10 years has been deported to Tajikistan. Sayora (who preferred that her last name not be published) was held in jail for 22 days before deportation. Other church members arrested and held by the NSS secret police in the raid include a man who was intimidated by officials and neighbours into moving out of his local mahalla (urban district). Five church members were fined and three were jailed for five days after trial. A registered Full Gospel congregation near Tashkent has failed to persuade the authorities to hold Anti-Terrorist police to account for violent threats made during a raid on the church. Police claimed the church was "preparing terrorists." After another police raid in north-west Uzbekistan, where all non-Muslim and non-Russian Orthodox religious activity is a criminal offence, a Protestant has been sentenced for "illegally teaching religion." The trial of other local Protestants is continuing. Officials have refused to discuss these cases with Forum 18.

22 June 2007

AZERBAIJAN: Baptist pastor still held on false charges

Imprisoned Baptist pastor Zaur Balaev has been held for over a month by Azerbaijan, on charges which witnesses insist are false, Forum 18 News Service has learnt. Pastor Balaev was arrested on 20 May, and the authorities intend to bring criminal charges of resisting officials with violence. The arrest took place during a police raid on a worship service which they insist – against Azerbaijan's international human rights commitments – was illegal as the church does not have state registration. The authorities have been denying the church legal status for 13 years. Since being detained over a month ago, "Zaur's health has deteriorated seriously" the head of the Baptist Union Ilya Zenchenko told Forum 18. Zenchenko also stated that police had hit Balaev in the face and that since his arrival in prison he has been threatened with violence. The Balaev family has had to go into debt to pay to take food to Zaur Balaev, who has been held over 250 km. (150 miles) from his home. The authorities have denied Balaev's family the opportunity to meet him since his arrest. Officials have refused to discuss the charges with Forum 18.

21 June 2007

CHINA: Will fashion for Confucius retard religious freedom?

After trying for decades to destroy Confucianism, the Communist party-state has now "endorsed" Confucian ideas and drawn on them in political slogans, Forum 18 News Service notes. It is also trying to promote a positive image of China through Confucius Institutes in foreign universities. But the selective adoption of Confucian ideas – for example to bolster nationalism - may delay genuine religious freedom for all. This use of Confucianism as a political instrument will have negative effects on the freedom of followers of "new" religions, like Christianity, and of religions identified with political separatism, such as Uighur Islam and Tibetan Buddhism. Chinese state endorsement and control has already produced a distortion of some religious communities' core beliefs and followers of Confucianism face the same threat. The state's priorities remain upholding its political position and ensuring societal quiescence, so it is wise to be cautious in evaluating Confucianism's apparent comeback.

20 June 2007

UZBEKISTAN: Jehovah's Witness latest victim of "illegal" religious teaching charges

Three weeks after Jehovah's Witness Irfon Khamidov was imprisoned for two years by Samarkand City Criminal Court for "illegal" religious teaching, the same court has sentenced fellow Jehovah's Witness Dilafruz Arziyeva on the same charges. She has received a two year correctional labour sentence, where 20 per cent of her wages will be docked, Jehovah's Witnesses have told Forum 18 News Service. Authorities in Samarkand have long refused to give the Jehovah's Witnesses legal status. A local official rejected an application in 2002, arguing that enough other religious communities were registered locally for people "to realise their freedom of conscience and to practise their beliefs". Also punished this year on "illegal" religious teaching charges was Pentecostal Christian Salavat Serikbayev. But he has had his two year correctional labour sentence reduced to one year. He has been assigned to cultivate plants in the desert, with 20 per cent of his wages docked.

19 June 2007

UZBEKISTAN: Church closes because of official pressure

Complaining that it was "too dangerous" to continue to meet, the Resurrection Full Gospel Pentecostal Church in the Fergana Valley town of Andijan – long denied state registration - has decided to close down. "We have faced such pressure from the leaders of the local mahallas [urban districts] and from the prosecutor, especially this year," the church's pastor Bakhtier Tuichiev told Forum 18 News Service. "It is too painful to talk about all the threats and insults we have had to endure." Fined last December, Tuichiev says he is now constantly monitored by police and is among a growing number of active Protestants denied permission to leave Uzbekistan. Eight members of another Full Gospel congregation in Andijan have had their appeals against fines imposed in May turned down. Their pastor, Dmitry Shestakov, is serving a four-year labour camp sentence.

15 June 2007

KAZAKHSTAN: More homes at Hare Krishna commune destroyed

Workers and police arrived this morning (15 June) at the village near Almaty where the embattled Hare Krishna commune is based to demolish twelve more Hare Krishna-owned homes. "The houses were literally crushed into dust. By ten o'clock it was all over," Hare Krishna spokesperson Maksim Varfolomeyev – who witnessed the latest demolitions - told Forum 18 News Service. The temple, which the devotees have been ordered to destroy by today, has not been touched but the devotees fear it could be the next target. Human rights activist Yevgeny Zhovtis is outraged at the continuing destruction. "The authorities are showing that they will do what they want, despite the international outrage at the earlier demolitions of Hare Krishna-owned homes." He believes the local administration chief "doesn't care about the political damage to Kazakhstan's reputation – or to its desire to chair the OSCE." Asked to explain the latest demolitions, one local official told Forum 18: "Here in Kazakhstan the Hare Krishnas are considered to be non-traditional."