Source: www.forum18.org
Date: January 24, 2025
https://www.forum18.org/archiv
By Victoria Arnold, Forum 18
Military officials in Russia are continuing to deny many young men the
opportunity to perform Alternative Civilian Service (ACS), rather than
military service, despite their demonstrating their pacifist convictions to
the military authorities.
If a Conscription Commission refuses ACS and the man does not appear when
called up for military service, he is vulnerable to prosecution under
Criminal Code Article 328 ("Evasion of conscription into military service
in the absence of legal grounds for exemption from this service"). This can
incur large fines or up to 2 years' imprisonment (see below).
A court in Krasnoyarsk Region found Baptist Zakhar Asmalovsky guilty under
this Article in November 2024 and fined him 60,000 Roubles, about three
weeks' average local wages. Krasnoyarsk Region Military Commissariat did
not respond to Forum 18's questions, including why it had refused
Asmalovsky ACS. The court did not respond to questions as to why it
convicted him despite his requests for ACS (see below).
Conscripts who want to do Alternative Civilian Service (ACS) can be caught
up in a cycle of repeated applications, refusals, and lawsuits which can
last years, and may result in their being sent to military units anyway.
German Strelkov, another Baptist from Khanty-Mansi Autonomous District, has
applied unsuccessfully for ACS at least three times. He is currently going
through his fourth round of legal proceedings in his attempt to realise his
right to conscientious objection (see below).
The authorities do not disclose the number of applications for ACS, but
human rights defenders – including from Call to Conscience
(https://t.me/peaceplea/867), and human rights group Citizen.Army.Law -
think that the number is rising.
Sergey Krivenko, director of Citizen.Army.Law, thought in May 2024 that the
numbers may have risen two or three times. Human rights defenders also
think that Conscription Commissions are increasingly rejecting such
requests, and courts in their turn are increasingly failing to uphold the
right to alternative service on grounds of conscience (see below).
Both these trends appear to have resulted from Russia's invasion of Ukraine
and subsequent mobilisation of reservists (men who have already completed
conscript service) in 2022.
The numbers of those who are doing ACS have also significantly risen.
According to Russian federal statistics, 1,199 young men were doing ACS in
the first half of 2023, and by the first half of 2024 the number had risen
to 2,022 (see below).
"After the war began, the situation changed dramatically, and now it has
become very difficult to obtain ACS," a Seventh-day Adventist from
Krasnodar Region, Andrey Bondarenko, commented to Forum 18 from outside
Russia. He noted that even a staff member at the military registration and
enlistment office had told him that "getting ACS is now a hellishly
difficult task" (see below).
"In my opinion, the situation will only get worse, and if obtaining
alternative service now is a lottery, where you can either get it or not,
then soon it will be completely impossible to do," Bondarenko added (see
below).
Many young men who apply for Alternative Civilian Service (ACS) are members
of the Council of Churches Baptists, which has a strong pacifist tradition.
While the church does not formally oppose the undertaking of military
service, when Baptist conscripts apply for ACS, church communities tend to
support them in collating documents for the Conscription Commission and
going to court if refused.
Other ACS applicants are known to come from the Seventh-day Adventist and
other Protestant traditions and occasionally from Orthodox backgrounds, or
describe themselves simply as Christian. Others are pacifists without a
religious motivation.
Until their organisations were liquidated and their activities banned as
"extremist" in 2017, Jehovah's Witnesses constituted approximately 60 per
cent of applicants for alternative civilian service and were usually
successful, Sergey Krivenko of the human rights group Citizen.Army.Law
observed to Radio Liberty's Sibir.Realii
(https://www.sibreal.org/a/voe
Now, however, young Jehovah's Witness men risk investigation and
prosecution for "continuing the activities of an extremist organisation" if
they cite active involvement in their religious communities as evidence of
their beliefs.
International human rights law
The United Nations (UN) Human Rights Committee, in General Comment 22
(https://www.refworld.org/doci
Thought, Conscience or Religion") of the International Covenant on Civil
and Political Rights
(https://www.ohchr.org/en/inst
(ICCPR), states that "the right to refuse to perform military service
(conscientious objection)" derives from Article 18.
Similarly, the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR)
also states that conscientious objection to military service comes under
ICCPR Article 18 and has recognised
(https://www.ohchr.org/en/cons
to have conscientious objection to military service as a legitimate
exercise of the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion".
The OHCHR also notes in its Conscientious Objection to Military Service
(https://www.ohchr.org/en/publ
guide that Article 18 is "a non-derogable right .. even during times of a
public emergency threatening the life of the nation".
In 2022 the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention stated (WGAD-HRC50
(https://www.ohchr.org/sites/d
"the right to conscientious objection to military service is part of the
absolutely protected right to hold a belief under article 18 (1) of the
Covenant [the ICCPR], which cannot be restricted by States." The Working
Group also stated that "States should refrain from imprisoning individuals
solely on the basis of their conscientious objection to military service,
and should release those that have been so imprisoned." Russia (as the
Soviet Union) ratified the ICCPR in 1973.
Alternative Civilian Service: Background
All Russian men must carry out military service for 12 months between the
ages of 18 and 30 (raised from 27 in January 2024). After this they are
enrolled in the reserves (and thereby become subject to mobilisation – as
occurred in autumn 2022). It is possible to gain exemption on medical
grounds, or deferrals for medical or educational reasons and in certain
family situations.
Conscripts also have the right, enshrined in the Constitution, "to replace
[military service] with Alternative Civilian Service [ACS]", and instead
work in a state or municipal institution, or in a civilian role in the
armed forces, for a longer period.
As yet, the explicit right to Alternative Civilian Service exists only for
conscripts, with no equivalent provided for in law for mobilised men. Some
have been able to avoid mobilisation to fight in Ukraine by applying for
ACS anyway.
Applicants for ACS who are not from Russia's indigenous peoples must
demonstrate that military service is contrary to their beliefs
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
on Alternative Civilian Service, "Citizens who have expressed a desire to
replace conscripted military service with Alternative Civilian Service must
substantiate [their claim] that military service is contrary to their
beliefs or religion", and set out "the reasons and circumstances [prichiny
i obstoyatelstva] that prompted [them] to apply for this".
If a Conscription Commission does not accept that a conscript genuinely
holds such beliefs, then it can refuse his application.
Russian and international human rights bodies - including the Movement of
Conscientious Objectors (https://stoparmy.org/) and the European Bureau for
Conscientious Objection (https://ebco-beoc.org/russia) - argue that such
procedures are often not carried out fairly or independently. Military
officials put undue pressure on ACS applicants, and decisions are largely
taken by military commissars, despite Conscription Commissions being
ostensibly independent organs chaired by local civilian officials.
The United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in
the Russian Federation, Mariana Katzarova, stated in her 28 October 2024
report (A/79/508 (https://undocs.org/A/79/508)) that "torture and ill
treatment have been used by Russian army commanders against conscientious
objectors, mobilized men and regular servicemen who refuse to obey orders
to fight against Ukraine".
Katzarova called on the Russian authorities to "Guarantee consistent
application of the process for the evaluation of citizens requesting to
undertake alternative civilian service".
The Conscription Commission may refuse an application
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
is missed or the procedure incorrectly followed; b) the submitted documents
and other information "are not in accordance with the citizen's arguments
that military service is contrary to his beliefs or religion"; c) the
submitted information is false; d) the individual has twice failed to
appear at meetings of the Conscription Commission; e) an individual has
previously been granted ACS and has failed to do it.
Russia's Constitutional Court ruled on 17 October 2006 that a missed
deadline should not be grounds for outright refusal to consider a request
for ACS on its merits. This remains, however, the most common reason for
denying ACS. The conclusion that an individual's submitted information does
not back up his professed beliefs is the second most common reason.
If an applicant is unsuccessful, he can either appeal to a higher-level
Conscription Commission or file an administrative lawsuit at a
district-level court, requesting that the Conscription Commission's
decision be ruled unlawful.
Going to court means that the implementation of the Conscription
Commission's decision is suspended until the court's decision enters into
legal force. If a lawsuit is initially unsuccessful, the plaintiff has one
month to appeal, and the decision does not enter legal force before the
appeal ruling. It is therefore likely that the call-up period will end
before the lawsuit is resolved, meaning that the individual is not liable
to be conscripted immediately even if his legal challenge fails. He can
then make a new application for alternative service in the next call-up
period.
Alternative Civilian Service increasing in popularity?
On 1 January 2024, an amendment to the Law on Military Service came into
force which raised the upper age limit for conscription from 27 to 30, thus
creating a much larger pool of potential conscripts
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
remains at 18.
According to Russian federal statistics, 1,645 young men were doing
Alternative Civilian Service (ACS) in the second half of 2023. This was a
37 per cent increase on the 1,199 young men doing ACS in the first half of
2023. It was also the first time the figure had exceeded 1,200 since
records began in 2013, from which the average number to 2024 was about
1,150 young men doing ACS. In the first half of 2024, the number rose again
to 2,022. (This data is published with a six-month delay, so the first half
of 2024 is the latest period for which figures are available.)
No statistics are available on the filing of applications for ACS, but "our
feeling is that the number of people interested in this has increased two
to three times", Sergey Krivenko, director of human rights group
Citizen.Army.Law, commented to Radio Liberty's Sibir.Realii on 14 May 2024
(https://www.sibreal.org/a/voe
(Citizen.Army.Law informs conscripts of their rights and helps them prepare
applications for alternative civilian service. The Justice Ministry added
the organisation to its register of foreign agents on 3 December 2021.)
Despite the rise in the number of applications, "We see a negative trend,
when both Conscription Commissions and courts are increasingly trying to
refuse citizens in their desire to undergo ACS, and refuse them without
reason", Krivenko noted.
According to Krivenko, ACS numbers are possibly under 0.1 per cent of the
entire conscription cohort, "but for some reason, military registration and
enlistment offices regard this as a threat", particularly since the
invasion of Ukraine.
Krivenko thinks that rising interest in the alternative service option is
because of the "high risks for conscripts" – that they will be coerced
into signing a contract, or sent to guard border areas, where they may be
subjected to Ukrainian shelling or cross-border raids by Russian troops
fighting on the Ukrainian side.
Criminal prosecution of Zakhar Asmalovsky, Krasnoyarsk Region
Baptist Zakhar Igoryevich Asmalovsky, from Krasnoyarsk Region, has applied
for Alternative Civilian Service three times since September 2023.
Officials have refused every application. After he did not turn up when
summoned by the military registration and enlistment office, Berezovka
District Court fined him 60,000 Roubles (about three weeks' average wages
in Krasnoyarsk Region) under Criminal Code Article 328, Part 1 ("Evasion of
conscription into military service in the absence of legal grounds for
exemption from this service") on 29 November 2024. Asmalovsky has lodged an
appeal.
"We testify to the faith of our brother Zakhar, [and] his beliefs, and are
ready to speak for him in court, about which written testimony was also
prepared", Council of Churches Baptists noted on Telegram on 27 September
2024 (https://t.me/novosti_MSZ_EHB/
conviction. "We ask you to pray for him that God will help him remain
faithful, grant him spiritual strength and wisdom to maintain his Christian
testimony before the world, and also for the mercy of the Lord when his
[criminal] case is heard in court."
Asmalovsky has twice challenged military officials' refusal to allow him
ACS in court. His first administrative lawsuit was unsuccessful at
Berezovka District Court on 7 September 2023 and he appealed unsuccessfully
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
Regional Court on 24 November 2023. After the Conscription Commission again
denied Asmalovsky ACS in the spring of 2024, Berezovka District Court
refused to uphold his second lawsuit on 27 May 2024 (unsuccessful appeal on
13 August 2024).
Asmalovsky later made a third application for ACS – with this one, he
missed the deadline, a fellow Baptist told Forum 18 on 4 December 2024. He
does not appear to have lodged another administrative suit.
Having considered Asmalovsky's first lawsuit, the District Court judge
concluded that neither Asmalovsky's autobiography nor the reference from
his place of study "indicates that [his] beliefs and religion preclude
conscripted military service" and "the mere fact that he is a believer and
attends church cannot serve as an unconditional basis for replacing his
military service with Alternative Civilian Service".
In spring 2024, Asmalovsky "went away and did not appear when summoned",
his fellow Baptist explained to Forum 18. Prosecutors then charged him
under Criminal Code Article 328, Part 1 ("Evasion of conscription into
military service in the absence of legal grounds for exemption from this
service").
This carries the following possible punishments:
- a fine of up to 200,000 Roubles;
- up to 2 years' assigned work
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
- up to 6 months' "arrest" (defined by Criminal Code Article 54 as "holding
the convicted person in conditions of strict isolation from society"); or
- up to 2 years' imprisonment.
Forum 18 wrote to Krasnoyarsk Region Military Commissariat on 14 January
2025, asking:
- why it had denied Asmalovsky's requests for Alternative Civilian Service
(ACS);
- what he should do to realise his constitutional right to ACS;
- why he was subject to criminal prosecution;
- and whether he would now be liable for conscription in the spring 2025
call-up.
Forum 18 had received no response by the end of the working day in
Krasnoyarsk Region of 24 January.
Forum 18 also asked Berezovka District Prosecutor's Office and Krasnoyarsk
Regional Prosecutor's Office why prosecutors had opened a criminal case
against Asmalovsky and whether he would now be liable for conscription.
Berezovka District Prosecutor Aleksey Nosovets replied on 22 January 2025.
He confirmed that his office had opened a criminal case against Asmalovsky
on 17 May 2024 but did not explain the reasons. He noted that individuals
with unspent or unexpunged convictions are not subject to conscription.
Berezovka District Court registered the criminal case against Asmalovsky on
31 May 2024. After six hearings, Judge Artur Nikitin found him guilty on 29
November 2024 and fined him 60,000 Roubles. Asmalovsky lodged an appeal on
10 December 2024. Krasnoyarsk Regional Court has not yet listed any
hearings.
If Asmalovsky's criminal conviction enters legal force, he will have an
active criminal record (sudimost)
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
pays his fine. During this time, he cannot be called up for military
service.
Forum 18 asked Berezovka District Court why it had found Asmalovsky guilty,
given that he had submitted several requests for Alternative Civilian
Service. Forum 18 had received no response by the end of the working day in
Krasnoyarsk Region of 24 January.
German Strelkov, Khanty-Mansi: Multiple lawsuits, still no ACS
Baptist German Aleksandrovich Strelkov, from Khanty-Mansiysk, appears to
have made four applications for Alternative Civilian Service (ACS).
Military officials rejected all of them
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
providing evidence of his pacifist beliefs. He lodged administrative
lawsuits challenging these decisions, but Khanty-Mansiysk District Court
refused to uphold any of them. He now has until 28 January 2025 to file an
appeal against the most recent court decision.
Baptist Council of Churches brothers German and Daniil Aleksandrovich
Strelkov first requested ACS in autumn 2023. Khanty-Mansiysk Military
Commissariat and Conscription Commission rejected their applications.
Khanty-Mansiysk District Court rejected their legal challenges
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
despite both brothers providing evidence of and witnesses to their
Christian pacifist beliefs. Neither appears to have appealed.
According to court records, Daniil Strelkov lodged no further lawsuits. It
is unclear whether he was subsequently successful in realising his right to
ACS, or whether he is now performing military service.
The Khanty-Mansiysk military authorities continued to deny German
Strelkov's repeated applications for ACS. He was unsuccessful in
challenging these refusals on 23 May 2024, with unsuccessful appeals on 10
September 2024 at the Court of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Region
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
2024. He withdrew another lawsuit from consideration on 20 November 2024,
apparently in advance of a further meeting of the Conscription Commission.
This nevertheless rejected his latest application on 26 November.
According to the 24 December court decision, seen by Forum 18, the
Khanty-Mansiysk Conscription Commission refused to allow German Strelkov to
do ACS on the grounds that the information he had submitted did not support
his argument that military service would go against his beliefs.
"From the documents submitted by the administrative plaintiff .. it does
not objectively follow and is not discernible that G.A. Strelkov actually
has stable convictions, confirmed by his way of life [and] the nature of
his social behaviour, over a significant period of time, which conflict
with military service," Judge Valery Cherkashin concluded.
German Strelkov explained in his application
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
Christian at the age of 15, attends a Baptist Council of Churches church,
and refuses to take up arms or study military matters, and included a
petition from members of his church and testimonials from four fellow
Baptists. Council of Churches Baptists have a strong pacifist tradition.
Despite this, Judge Cherkashin decided that the application did not
"contain information indicating the formation of sincere and deep
convictions in the applicant that make it impossible for [him] to perform
military service".
Judge Cherkashin characterised German's repeated unsuccessful requests for
ACS and the court's previous rulings against him as "aimed at abusing the
right to judicial protection, as well as the right to lodge an application
for ACS".
Before the beginning of the working day of 24 January, Forum 18 asked Judge
Cherkashin in writing why he had dismissed German Strelkov's evidence of
and witnesses to his deeply-held Christian pacifist beliefs, and had
refused to allow him to undertake ACS. Forum 18 had received no reply by
the end of the court's working day in Khanty-Mansiysk of 24 January.
Khanty-Mansiysk District Court had on 28 November granted German Strelkov
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
protection measure" suspending his conscription until any court decision
came into force. Judge Cherkashin nevertheless overturned this in the 24
December ruling. The ruling is due to come into force one month after
publication of the full written verdict, i.e. 28 January, if no appeal is
lodged.
Forum 18 has repeatedly asked the Khanty-Mansiysk Military Commissariat
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
refused to allow German Strelkov to do Alternative Civilian Service (ACS),
and what else he would need to include in his application in order to
realise his right to ACS. Forum 18 had received no reply by the end of the
working day in Khanty-Mansiysk of 24 January.
Andrey Bondarenko, Seventh-day Adventist, Sochi
Andrey Ilyich Bondarenko is a fifth-generation Seventh-day Adventist from
the Black Sea city of Sochi. Adventists have a long-standing strong
pacifist tradition. Officials refused Bondarenko Alternative Civilian
Service (ACS) in April 2023 on grounds of missing the application deadline.
The refusal came despite the Constitutional Court's 2006 ruling that this
should not be a reason for not considering an application on its merits.
Bondarenko's treatment at Sochi's military commissariat attests to the
increasing difficulty conscripts have been facing in attempting to realise
their right to ACS in the wake of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and to the
aggressive attitude held by many officials towards "non-traditional"
religious denominations.
Bondarenko, an undergraduate student, had an academic deferral from
military service. This became invalid, however, when he transferred from
one institution to another in 2022, as a result of a mistake by his first
university. After his subsequent unsuccessful request for ACS, the academic
deferral was reinstated once the universities clarified the matter with the
military authorities. Nevertheless, the military authorities told
Bondarenko he would have to return to the military commissariat in
September 2023.
"Being on the watchlist of the Russian authorities and the military
registration and enlistment office, I fled from this 'Evil Empire' [Russia]
at the first opportunity, without waiting for the date indicated on the
summons," he explained to Forum 18 in January 2025. He and his family are
now seeking asylum abroad.
Upon applying for ACS, Bondarenko underwent a medical examination. Despite
his having two "significant" health issues, military medics passed him at
the highest fitness level. Like other conscripts, he also had to see a
psychologist.
"It was interesting to watch how, with all the guys ahead of me, [the
psychologist] asked only a few basic and standard questions, like 'Do you
have depression?', 'Do you have suicidal thoughts?' and after that he
filled out the form and sent them away," Bondarenko told Forum 18.
"And when it was my turn, he opened the computer (with information about
me, as I understand it), his face changed greatly, and he began to ask me
in a rude tone why I was a sectarian, why I didn't love my Motherland,
whether I was an agent of Israel and the USA, and that THEY (the military
registration and enlistment office) knew for sure that I was," Bondarenko
added.
"This nonsense continued for so long that a crowd of people formed around
us, who watched this very strange process with interest. After an overly
long interrogation, he shoved a piece of paper at me and let me leave the
office."
Bondarenko nevertheless thought that he would be allowed to undertake ACS,
given that other young men from his church had succeeded in doing so
(including those who had missed the application deadline). They, however,
had applied before the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
This was a time when, in Bondarenko's view, ACS was "quite easy to obtain,
since the state did not create any obstacles to it, as a result of the fact
that .. officials simply had no time for this – they calmly took bribes,
stole from state programmes and state orders, and did not particularly
create obstacles to the observance of civil rights".
After the war began, "the situation changed dramatically", Bondarenko
thinks. "Even the woman at the military registration and enlistment office
who helped me collect the documents said that now getting ACS is a
hellishly difficult task."
In online chats and communities for ACS applicants, "everyone noticed the
same thing: that a huge number of people were denied [ACS], and precisely
at the beginning of the war", Bondarenko observed to Forum 18. "Often, an
attempt to send a person to war by the state is connected precisely with
his political opinion, and anti-war activities, as well as his
'non-traditional religion', as it was with me."
Bondarenko described his experience at the meeting of the Conscription
Commission on 4 April 2023 in an account for Christians Against War on 26
November 2024
(https://shaltnotkill.info/ags
A Federal Security Service (FSB) Colonel ("spitting all over the office in
the heat of anger", as Bondarenko later told Forum 18) "took my folder of
papers and contemptuously threw it on the edge of the table, telling me
that he would not read it, and shouted, literally: 'What kind of scum have
we raised over 30 years of democracy that does not want to defend the
Motherland! Explain to me what is wrong with going and killing those who
have encroached on the Orthodox Church in Ukraine? Now you, a sectarian,
will go to defend and fight for the Orthodox Church in Ukraine, for 200,000
Roubles. You have been denied alternative service, you will go to war as a
normal soldier'."
The minimum monthly salary for a Russian soldier fighting in Ukraine is
approximately 200,000 Roubles.
All the other men who requested ACS on the same day (apparently on grounds
of non-religious pacifist beliefs) also had their applications for ACS
refused, Bondarenko noted.
Bondarenko received a document, seen by Forum 18, refusing him ACS on
grounds of missing the deadline. The Conscription Commission told him to
report to a military commissar for a summons to military service on 11
April 2023. The missed deadline, Bondarenko observed to Forum 18, is the
"most convenient way" to refuse ACS: "Considering that I was literally
dragged to the military registration and enlistment office in the middle of
the academic year, I physically could not submit an application on time, so
such a response was a really vile bureaucratic trick."
The military commissar initially would not consider delaying the summons to
allow Bondarenko either to finish the academic year or have the necessary
treatment for his medical conditions. He also attempted to discourage him
from going to court, since he "would be drafted into the army right from
the courtroom", Bondarenko wrote in his account for Christians Against War.
Despite this, the commissar then agreed not to issue a summons for 11 April
2023 and gave Bondarenko a few days to get his academic deferral
reinstated. Bondarenko's original university eventually did this, but
"Having seen the hand of God in receiving this deferral, we did not
hesitate any longer, realising that in September I could be drafted into
service, and if they did not draft me in September, they would draft me
later and certainly to war, as this FSB officer had promised". Bondarenko
left the country later in 2023 with his family.
Forum 18 wrote to Sochi City Conscription Commission on 17 January 2025 to
ask:
- why it had denied Bondarenko alternative civilian service for missing the
application deadline when the Constitutional Court has ruled that this
should not be a reason for refusal; and
- why Bondarenko had been subjected to derogatory remarks about his
religious affiliation by both the psychologist and a member of the
commission.
Forum 18 had received no reply by the afternoon of the working day in Sochi
of 24 January 2025.
Russia "does not care about the law and the Constitution in which civil
rights are written"
"I had to endure all this only because I am a Protestant," Seventh-day
Adventist Andrey Bondarenko told Forum 18. He noted that "After the war
[against Ukraine] began, we saw the acceleration of long-running processes
that first of all hit civil rights and freedoms .. a systematic return to
the times of the USSR."
While before it was possible to realise one's right to Alternative Civilian
Service, now "Russia needs soldiers, and it absolutely does not care about
the law and the Constitution in which civil rights are written," Bondarenko
commented. "Everyone who can be is mobilised for war, and often Protestants
are deliberately forced to take up arms, knowing that they cannot do so."
Bondarenko added that some churches fear "a complete ban as happened to
Jehovah's Witnesses", and therefore shy away from helping their church
members.
(Russia's Supreme Court banned all Jehovah's Witness activity
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
2017. Courts have since then convicted hundreds of Jehovah's Witnesses
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
"extremism"-related criminal charges, handing down long jail terms,
suspended sentences and fines.)
Bondarenko thinks the situation will only get worse. "If now getting
alternative service is a lottery, where you can either get it or not, then
soon it will be completely impossible to do," he told Forum 18. "And the
proof of this is in the war. There are thousands of photos on the Internet
of the so-called 'torture pits' into which Russian soldiers who refuse to
take up arms are thrown, where they sit for weeks without food and endure
torture and beatings. All that remains is to pray to God that he intervenes
and resolves this situation."
The UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Russian
Federation, Mariana Katzarova, stated in her 28 October 2024 report
(A/79/508 (https://undocs.org/A/79/508))
detention exist close to the front line where hundreds are kept and
subjected to torture to punish them." (END)
More reports on freedom of thought, conscience and belief in Russia
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
For background information see Forum 18's Russia religious freedom survey
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
Forum 18's compilation of Organisation for Security and Co-operation in
Europe (OSCE) freedom of religion or belief commitments
(https://www.forum18.org/archi
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