Two Residents of the Kuril Islands Were Sentenced to Suspended Term. The Court Considered Conversations About the Bible to Be Extremism

On March 24, 2025, the judge of the Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk City Court, Mariya Manaeva, sentenced residents of Iturup Island, Olga Kalinnikova and Larisa Potapova, to 2.5 years suspended. To participate in court hearings, they had to fly to Sakhalin, each time covering a distance of 450 kilometers.

In her final plea, Olga Kalinnikova said: "Laws are created to protect society from criminal acts. The law on extremism provides for punishment for specific actions of an extremist nature. The list of these actions does not include peaceful conversations with people about God. Such conversations, on the contrary, are protected by the state, by the Constitution."

Larisa Potapova also pleaded not guilty to extremism, stating: "The most harmless people were labeled extremists. It is very strange, because Jehovah's Witnesses do not take up arms, they are alien to any form of cruelty."

The criminal case was initiated in October 2023, a month later the women were searched. As it turned out, they had come to the attention of the law enforcement officers a few years earlier. Olga said that since 2017, six decisions have been made to refuse to initiate a criminal case against her. Initially, investigator Kirill Deshko opened a case against Kalinnikova and Potapova "for participation in the activities of an extremist organization," and six months later expanded the scope of the charge by adding an article on the involvement of other persons in this activity.

According to the defense of believers, the main witness in the case was an elderly woman, with whom Kalinnikova and Potapova talked about the Bible and whom they selflessly helped in everyday matters. With the woman's permission, the operatives conducted hidden video filming in her house. Potapova commented on these actions as follows: "I have no grudge against [witness—Ed.]. It is so strange to hear from a person with whom we are sitting in an embrace and smiling in the photo from the case file that she was afraid of me and asked me not to come. And it is all the more surprising that she repeatedly came to my house herself."

The case went to the Kurilsk District Court in May 2024, but two judges recused themselves one after the other. As a result, the case was sent to the Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk City Court for consideration. Due to the long distance, believers applied to participate in the hearings via videoconferencing but were refused. The state prosecutor requested a 5.5-year suspended sentence for them.

A total of 10 Jehovah's Witnesses have faced criminal prosecution in the Sakhalin Region. One of them was sentenced by the court to six years in a penal colony.