The Court of Appeal Upheld the Sentence Against Sergey Kuznetsov From Vyazemsky – 2 Years and 5 Months Suspended for Reading the Bible

On March 18, 2023, the panel of judges of the Khabarovsk Regional Court approved the sentence for Sergey Kuznetsov for his faith - 2 years and 5 months suspended with a 2-year probationary period. The believer still insists on his innocence.

Three months earlier, the Vyazemsky District Court found Kuznetsov guilty of participating in the activity of an extremist organization. Sergey did not deny that he is one of Jehovah's Witnesses, and that he prayed and discussed the Bible with his friends. But, as the believer emphasized at the hearings in the court of first instance, he only worshipped God peacefully, and did not continue the activity of a liquidated legal entity.

In his appeal, Sergey Kuznetsov commented on the verdict as follows: “The court did not take into account that the right to be a believer does not depend on the existence of a legal entity or its liquidation, and also did not substantiate in the verdict why a peaceful way of expressing faith in God was regarded by it as a way of committing a crime".

In total, 30 Jehovah's Witnesses have faced criminal prosecution for their faith in the Khabarovsk Territory. Three of them have already been given suspended sentences of various lengths.

On June 7, 2022, the European Court of Human Rights fully exonerated Jehovah's Witnesses in Russia. The court's decision states that "the imposition of criminal sanctions for manifestation of religious beliefs amounts to an interference with the exercise of the right to freedom of religion" (§ 264).