A Baptist church in Russian-occupied city of Melitopol has been raid 3 times in a year by armed, masked men, and its pastor accused of "illegal missionary activity”.
Entry sign to the city. / Melitopol City Council..
Christians in occupied Ukraine continue to be under threat, Norwegian human rights group Forum 18, reports.
Religious leaders are investigated, questioned, sent to trial and fined, while churches are raid and sometimes forcibly close. Furthermore, Russian-controlled courts continue to hear illegal missionary activity cases.
On 18 September 2024, a year after the previous raid, the Council of Churches Baptist church in Russian-occupied city of Melitopol was raid by armed, masked in camouflage uniform men, who broke up during the worship service.
"They began checking literature from the church library and studying who had published it; they also checked everyone's phones and passports”, local Baptists said.
The armed men asked pastor Dmitry Malakhov why the church was not registered with the Russian authorities, what organisation it belongs to and who was its leader. They filed a record of an offence against him.
On 12 October, the local police officer summoned Malakhov, accusing him of leading a religious service without informing the authorities and conducting illegal missionary activity.
Malakhov refused to sign anything and explained that it was a regular service and that, under the Russian Constitution, they had the right to hold such a service.
Armed, masked men raid the church again on 10 November, when the children were singing at the Sunday worship service.
"They checked the passports of those present, questioned the deacon, Sergey Potemkin, and ordered everyone to disperse”, pointed out the members.
Officers later summoned Potemkin at the Russian Police's Department for the Struggle with Extremism and Terrorism, and "questioned him at length about the life of the church, its leaders and other things”, Baptists told Forum 18.
On 9 December, first deputy prosecutor at the Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia Prosecutor's Office, Dmitry Zagoruyko, drew up and handed three records against pastor Malakhov to court.
He was accused of "conducting missionary activity; failing to notify the authorities of the existence of his Council of Churches Baptist congregation, and implementing activities by a religious organisation without indicating its official full name”.
On 18 December, a court closed the case of illegal missionary activity, because of the statute of limitations, and issued a warning in the one on failing to notify the Russian authorities of the church’s existence. The prosecutor said he will appeal.
The hearing on the third case of failing to give the organisation's full legal name was set for 21 January.
In addition to those cases, in mid-October, a court in Russian-occupied Luhansk region fined a local religious leader 5,000 Russian Roubles for "illegal missionary activity". This represents about one week's average local wage.
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