The Kemerovo Court of Cassation Upheld the Conviction of Aleksandr Bondarchuk and Sergey Yavushkin—Four Years Suspended

On January 10, 2023, the Eighth Cassation Court of General Jurisdiction in Kemerovo upheld the conviction of Aleksandr Bondarchuk and Sergey Yavushkin - 4 years of suspended sentence. The hearing was held in person and was attended by 12 of the defendants' relatives and friends.

The court of first instance passed its sentence in June 2021, and in February 2022, the appeal left it unchanged. Aleksandr Bondarchuk and Sergey Yavushkin still do not agree with the charges against them, as they reported in their appeals: "Neither the verdict nor the appellate ruling provides clear criteria by which we can clearly see what specific actions we took were a continuation of illegal activities of a liquidated legal entity."

"I was sentenced," commented Bondarchuk, "only for worshiping Jehovah God, calling it an extremist, illegal action. And this is absurd!"

Yavushkin also explained to the court that Jehovah's Witnesses can in no way be connected with extremism: "Believing in Jehovah God and at the same time feeling hatred towards people are incompatible concepts. That is why I cannot be called an extremist in any way. Loving and respecting people is my way of life.

In June 2022, the European Court of Human Rights ruled that persecution of Jehovah's Witnesses in Russia is illegal: "Only religious statements and actions containing or calling for violence, hatred or discrimination can constitute grounds for suppression as 'extremist'. [...] The courts have not found any of the petitioners' words, acts or actions to be motivated by violence, hatred or discrimination against others or to have connotations of violence, hatred or discrimination" (§271).