Overview
- Valeriy Knyazev and Indus Talipov from Izhevsk were sentenced this week, becoming the oldest Jehovah’s Witnesses currently imprisoned, according to the church.
- The group says the case hinged on secret testimony from a man using the pseudonym Lozhkin, described as part of an undercover network targeting believers.
- Jehovah’s Witnesses report 175 adherents jailed in Russia and Crimea and nearly 900 prosecutions since the religion was banned as “extremist” in 2017.
- The European Court of Human Rights ruled in 2022 that Russia’s ban on Jehovah’s Witness activity was unlawful, yet prosecutions have continued.
- Church accounts say authorities opened the Izhevsk investigation in June 2024, searched several homes, and charged Knyazev, Talipov, and Alexander Stefanidin with organizing extremist activity.