For the First Time, Belarus Authorities Arrest a Jehovah’s Witness Persecuted for His Faith in Russia

[Isabella]

On February 21, 2020, in the Republic of Belarus, police officers detained Russian citizen Nikolay Makhalichev, 36. Checking his documents, they declared he was wanted by the Russian authorities since he was professing a banned religion. Three days later the prosecutor sent him to pre-trial detention facility SIZO-2 in Vitebsk, Belarus.

https://jw-russia.org/en/news/2020/02/83.html

[Arauna]

Belarus is almost more communist than Russia -  the places people can flee to are becoming less and less here in this region of the world. 

The republic of Georgia is less communist but the official church is just as opposed to JWs as is the nationalistic state church of Russia- the orthodox church.

[Isabella]

Belarusian law enforcers detained a Russian citizen belonging to Jehovah’s Witnesses.

It is the first time that Belarus has withheld a Jehovah’s Witness who is persecuted on religious grounds in Russia, the association says on its website.

On February 21, the Belarusian police ID’ed 36-year-old Nikolai Makhalichev and informed him of his being put on the international wanted list by Russia over professing ‘prohibited’ religion. As a result, the believer landed up in a temporary detention centre in the Belarusian town of Haradok.

Three days later, a local prosecutor ruled to transfer the man to Prison Nr 2 in Vitsebsk. According to the order, Makhalichev ‘acted intentionally, he was driven by religious intolerance and extremist motives which manifest themselves in the propaganda of superiority of Jehovah’s Witnesses’ religious doctrine followers over others persons.

The believer considers the ruling illegal; he is set to appeal against it in the Belarusian court. The man has also filed a complaint with the UN Human Rights Committee.

The criminal case against Nikolai Makhalichev was opened in January, 2019 in Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug.

https://belsat.eu/en/news/first-time-ever-belarus-arrests-jehovah-s-witness-persecuted-in-russia/