On 31 August, a St Petersburg court jailed 55-year-old Fr Ioann Kurmoyarov for 3 years and banned him from posting on the internet for 2 years for distributing "false information about the Russian Armed Forces". His is the second known prison term for opposing Russia's war against Ukraine from a religious perspective. In March, a Moscow court jailed Mikhail Simonov for 7 years. Fr Ioann pleaded guilty, telling the court: "I undertake in the future not to touch upon the topic of the conduct of...| www.forum18.org
Forum 18 News Service documents here the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe's (OSCE) most important and relevant human dimension commitments on freedom of religion and belief up to the end of December 2015. Human dimension commitments are agreed unanimously among all 57 participating States. All participating States have formally and publicly promised to implement these politically-binding commitments, and have also agreed that the implementation of commitments is a legitima...| www.forum18.org