MOSCOW, February 10. /TASS/. Organizers and participants of the Jehovah's Witnesses extremist group have been detained in Moscow, Spokeswoman for the Main Directorate of the Russian Investigative Committee in Moscow Yulia Ivanova told TASS on Wednesday.
"A number of organizers and participants of the group have been detained, who will be taken to the Investigative Committee’s department to carry out the necessary investigative activities," Ivanova said.
According to the spokeswoman, investigators jointly with the Russian Interior Ministry and the Federal Security Service’s department in Moscow and the Moscow Region as well as the National Guard are conducting searches in 16 places in Moscow, where the group members are registered.
A criminal case was opened under Part 1 and Part 2 of Article 282.2 of the Russian Criminal Code ("organizing activity of an extremist organization"). The case is based on the files on launching the activity in Moscow of the Jehovah's Witnesses’ managing center in Russia recognized by the Supreme Court’s decision as an extremist group.
The spokeswoman explained that since September 2017 a branch of Jehovah's Witnesses had launched work in northern Moscow. They held clandestine meetings in an apartment to study religious literature and data included in other information sources promoting the Jehovah's Witnesses’ teachings. The organizers also held online meetings, she noted.
Jehovah’s Witnesses is an international religious organization that supports offbeat views on the essence of the Christian faith and provides special interpretations of many commonly accepted notions. In August 2017, the Russian Justice Ministry included Jehovah’s Witnesses and its 395 local religious branches to the list of organizations outlawed in the country. The Russian Supreme Court satisfied the claim of the Justice Ministry to shut down the organization on April 20, 2017.