Report of Anatoly Krasikov

(Cape Town, February 27, 2007)

 

Allow me, on behalf of the Euro-Asia Chapter of the International Religious Liberty Association, to greet the organizers and all participants of this unique forum and, first of all, our cordial hosts, African brothers and sisters. 

 

Africa is a vast and diverse continent that has its own difficult problems. In the latter half of twentieth century the colonialism in Africa was practically abolished. People thought that the time of universal peace and co-operation would come. However, the unprecedented cruel conflicts broke out in different countries of the Dark Continent. Over 5 million people have been killed in 50 intestine wars during 40 years after the African states achieved their independence. The more valuable are the lessons of peacemaking of those who deliver the God’s commandment ‘Thou shalt not kill’ to people. In this connection, we must not forget the object lesson of your country.

 

In November 1990, when the future of civil peace in South Africa hung on a thread, the leaders of all national churches held a meeting. In his speech before the participants of that meeting, the Nobel Prize winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu responded to contrite words of a certain white pastor as follows: “When they ask me for forgiveness I cannot deny”. His voice was heard. The ruling white minority agreed to grant equal rights to the black majority, which was deprived of such rights contrary to God’s commandments and international law. 

 

Some years ago I was lucky enough to get to know two eminent South Africans, Wilhelm Verwoerd and his wife Melanie. Wilhelm, a grandson of Herdrik Frensch Verwoerd who once created the apartheid system in South Africa, joined the fighters against that unjust system as a young man, became a member of the African National Congress and then was elected to Parliament as a representative from that party. Melanie held the same views in politics. Later she followed diplomacy as a career to serve as the South African Ambassador in London and Dublin.

 

We met at the international conference in Caux, Switzerland. The agenda included the issues of reconciliation of former enemies through their repentance and mutual forgiveness. Wilhelm and Melanie told me many interesting things about the transformation of South Africa, which was a country of severe racial discrimination, into a country in which all citizens are equal before the law. Recently I have known from the Internet that Wilhelm is now sharing your experience of peaceful solution of the hard domestic conflict with the people in Ulster (Northern Ireland).

 

Unlike South Africa, both Russian Federation and Ireland belong to European culture. Nevertheless, we consider your positive experience useful and, what is more, exceptionally important for Europe and especially my country, whose territory extends over two continents, Europe and Asia. For it is a matter of human values that is of particular importance for each of us.

 

Some twenty years ago my country, then it was the USSR, started abandoning both totalitarian regime of the state atheism and the cold war that had led our planet to the verge of disaster. In 1988 the Soviet Government headed by Mikhail Gorbachov permitted to officially celebrate the thousandth anniversary of the baptism of Russia. The anniversary celebrations became a starting-point for the truly global changes.

 

The life was changing before our very eyes. In spring 1989 we saw an event unheard-of in Soviet history, the first comparatively free election to the supreme legislative body of the USSR. Giving way before strong pressure from below, the Communist party abandoned its political and ideological monopoly fixed by the Article 6 of the Constitution of the USSR. In summer 1990 it was decided to conduct an investigation of the dependence of religious figures on the state. A special parliamentary commission released a report, which corroborated the fact of the “deep penetration of secret service agents to the religious associations”. This circumstance was qualified as “a serious threat to both society and State”.  

 

Unfortunately, the bodies similar to the South Africa Truth and Reconciliation Commission have been never established in Russia. Nobody has repented of the errors and crimes of the past. In my view this fact represents one of the main reasons for the present-day difficulties in Russian society, including the problems originated by attempts to restrict religious freedom. 

 

Anyhow the outset of our way to open civil society seemed to be promising. In October 1990 a liberal law “On Freedom of Religion” was adopted. According to this law, any permission of authorities to establish a religious association would not be required. The religious associations could be dissolved only by their members or by a court action (in case the activities of said associations were found contradicting to their constitutions and the State law).   

 

In 1991, the fifteen republics that comprised the USSR decided to live independently, and the disintegration of the Soviet Union proved to be peaceful. There were no wars as it happened within the same period in another disintegrated country, Yugoslavia. On the contrary, most of former Soviet republics spoke for preservation of their mutual relations within the framework of a new Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).

 

In December 1993 the Constitution of the Russian Federation, the largest post Soviet country, was adopted. The Constitution declared man, his rights and freedoms the supreme value (Article 2) and established ideological diversity (Article 13), separation of religious associations from the State and their equality before the law (Article 14).

 

The above principles were warmly supported by the Russian Chapter of the International Religious Liberty Association that was established in 1992. The founders of the Russian IRLA Chapter were Russian Orthodox Church, Protestants (Adventists, Baptists, Evangelicals, Pentecostals), Catholics, Moslems, Buddhists, Judaists, other religious associations, as well as some eminent public figures and many scientists.

 

It was not only correct but also timely decision to establish our organization. The impenitent former politicians recovered and launched a counter-offensive. Allow me to cite a passage from my report presented at the conference of the Russian IRLA Chapter, at which I was elected the President, in February 1997:

 

“Religious freedom in this country is mainly threatened by the heirs of totalitarian regime, who dream of restoring it in one or another form that would enable them to monopolize the power over country and people. The second, no less important threat to religious freedom in Russia springs from the activities of unfortunately numerous clergymen and laypersons of Russian Orthodox Church, which are making extremist demands and are counting on the etatization of the church and clericalization of the State under the aegis of orthodoxy”.

 

The ‘moment of truth’ came when a draft law “On Freedom of Conscience and Religious Associations”, was introduced into Federal Assembly (Parliament), with the object of superseding the liberal law adopted in 1990. The draft law substantially curtailed the rights of believers as compared to the 1990 law. The Russian IRLA Chapter urged President Boris Yeltsin to make use of his constitutional powers to prevent passing a law that would conflict with the Constitution and international obligations of Russia. The Main Legal Department of the Presidential Administration supported our position. These efforts inclined President Yeltsin to put a veto on a new law already adopted by Parliament. 

 

This occurred in July 1997. However, two months after Boris Yeltsin subscribed his name to a new law that was practically unchanged. Despite called a ‘compromise law’, the altered document took a turn for the worse rather than for the better. Such an about-face done by the President in his policy could be explained only by the pressure of the opponents of religious freedom. The President was pressurized by the Internal Policy Department of the Presidential Administration, dominated by people hankering after bygone times. The limitation of the right of Russian citizens to religious liberty was also advocated by the ‘hawks’ from Russian Orthodox Church. 

 

In the issue the law adopted in autumn 1997 teems with contradictions. Its preamble contains a number of very fine statements taken from the Russian Constitution and Russia’s international treaties. Further the punishable offences are listed. As a matter of fact, that list is applicable to any association or citizen of whatever constitutional state. It was not necessary to specially iterate that list in the law relating to religious associations. This, it seems, was done in order to make the public believe that some religious communities might be especially criminogenic. In conclusion, the said law specifies the rights to be henceforth forfeited by religious communities that have not obtained a special State registration. 

 

The central idea of the law is undoubtedly that referring to mandatory re-registration of all religious associations in Russia. According to the law, all religious associations are to be repeatedly entered in the state register, including the associations already included in that register under the 1990 law. However, it was that cardinal question that caused an unexpected defeat of the opponents of religious freedom.

 

Let me cite amazing statistics. Before the said law was adopted, some 14,000 religious associations had been entered in the state register of the Ministry of Justice. Today, the number of registered religious associations exceeds 23,000. They represent more than 70 various confessions, from Christianity, Islam, Buddhism and Judaism (those confessions are specifically mentioned in the law), to newly arisen religious movements such as Bahai Faith, Jehova’s Witnesses, Society for Krishna Consciousness, Unification Church (Sun Myung Moon Church), Scientologists, and many others.

 

We would see nothing of the kind, if the Constitutional Court of Russia did not reject an idea of retroactive application of the 1997 law, thus legislating against excluding as many non-Orthodox believers as possible from the religious life in Russia.  

 

Two of the co-authors of this ‘miracle’ are now present among us. They are distinguished Russian lawyers, co-chairmen of Slavic Center for Law and Justice, members of IRLA Euro-Asia Chapter (former Russian IRLA Chapter) Mr. Anatoly Pchelintsev and Mr. Vladimir Ryakhovsky. It was they who represented, together with their colleagues, the interests of discriminated Russia’s religious communities in the Constitutional Court, the judgements of which are legally binding for the President, Parliament and Government of the Russian Federation. Anatoly Pchelintsev is Baptist, and Vladimir Ryakhovsky is Evangelical, none the less they are selflessly pleading the cause of believers of any confessions threatened to be discriminated by authorities.

 

Over the past years the Expert Council of the Ministry of Justice, of which our brother Anatoly Pchelintsev is a member, has been our actual ally. Prof. Miran Mchedlov, who was chairman of this Expert Council till his recent death, participated in almost all conferences of Russian IRLA Chapter. He was my old colleague and friend, with whom we maintained good relations since 1960s.  

 

In case of necessity, the Expert Council has been preparing, on commissions from the Ministry of Justice, legal opinions, according to 1997 law, of a religious nature of communities claiming to insertion in the official state register. Those opinions have been always unbiased and veridical. As far as I know there was only one unfavorable opinion. It was a case of a certain “Old Russian Ingling Community”, whose documents were qualified to bear the marks of extremism and whose symbols were based on Nazi attributes.

 

Unfortunately, even the insertion of a religious organization in the Russia’ state register cannot guarantee that its local branches in the subjects of the Russian Federation shall be recognized by authorities and permitted to function without obstruction. Especially intolerant are the municipal authorities in City Moscow. I would like to give here only the most glaring example.

 

The Moscow authorities ordered to impose a ban on the activities of the world-famous Salvation Army. That church, widely engaged in works of mercy and officially registered by the Ministry of Justice of Russia, was declared ‘a foreign paramilitary formation’. In the course of a propaganda campaign against the Salvation Army the slogans were heard like ‘Foreign soldiers, off you go!” In October 2006 the European Court of Human Rights in Strasburg ruled that Russia should put an end to such an arbitrary behavior and pay pecuniary compensation for moral damages suffered by the Salvation Army. 

 

This and other similar rulings of the European Court of Human Rights have displeased nationalistic members of Russian Parliament, whose voices are heard for revising the relations of the Russian Federation with the European Council and other international organizations. The more radical suggestions were also made for denying Russia’s obligations under international agreements and legal documents relating to human rights.

 

Today, it is legally and practically impossible. The Article 15 of the Russian Constitution reads: “The universally-recognized norms of international law and international treaties and agreements of the Russian Federation shall be a component part of its legal system. If an international treaty or agreement of the Russian Federation fixes other rules than those envisaged by law, the rules of the international agreement shall be applied”.

 

It is no a mere chance that introduction of possible changes into the Constitution of the Russian Federation is now vividly discussed by the politic elite in Russia. The Chairman of the Department for Foreign Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchy Metropolitan Kirill carries his vision to excess. In the address he delivered in the Greek Parliament in 1999, he criticized the international rules relating to human rights as “exceptionally western and liberal”. “Unfortunately, – Kirill said, – the Orthodox spiritual and cultural tradition was presented in no way, for ideological and political reasons, by Soviet diplomacy in elaborating contemporary standards of international relations and human rights”.

 

For Metropolitan Kirill, the Moslems, Buddhists and Judaists could coexist with the Orthodox Christians within the same Russian State only on condition that they are referred to non-Russian nations: Tartars, Bashkirs, and North Caucasians (Moslems); Buryats, Tuvinians, and Kalmyks (Buddhists); Jews (Judaists). Kirill opines that non-Orthodox Christians (Catholics and Protestants) should recognize the ‘State-building role’ and privileges of the Orthodox church. 

 

Speaking recently in a live broadcast over the Voice of Russia governmental radio station, this man, who is called ‘strategist of Russian Orthodoxy’, said: “Some 80 per cent of our people have been baptized Orthodox. If anybody is not baptized, his parents were likely baptized. Both culturologically and spiritually, such a person must be associated with Orthodoxy... Therefore, he himself and his family are to be nurtured by our shepherds, who are bearing such a responsibility to God, people and country. But, all of a sudden, we come across a missionary in this area who says: “We are also entitled to be here”... It is an attempt to seed other people’s field that was already fertilized”.

 

The most typical problems we have been dealt with over a distance of ten years after adoption of the 1997 law, are as follows:

 

- preparation of new legislative acts that would come into conflict with the Constitution and the laws of the Russian Federation, including the 1997 law (as interpreted by the Constitutional Court),

- refusal of registration (or re-registration)of ‘alien’ (in opinion of local authorities)religious organizations for purely formal reasons,

- attempts to hinder the normal functioning of non-Orthodox religious organizations, in particular, through prohibiting the visits in Russia for invited (according to the established order) foreign clergymen, mainly Catholics and Protestants,

- refusal of extension of leasing of the State-owned buildings, in which the meetings were held by churches, which had forfeited their own houses of prayer in the days of atheism,

- use of advanced information technologies for creating the ‘enemy image’ through dissemination of unauthentic and even patently false information about the doctrines and daily activities of ‘non-traditional’ (as determined by some officials)communities of believers.

 

Nevertheless, we, members of IRLA Euro-Asia Chapter, make every effort to continue the dialogue or, if possible, collaboration with both politicians and our opponents among the religious figures, for the sake of protecting religious freedom as a panhuman value. In this dialogue and collaboration, we are trying to explain to other party that we have common past, present and future, any twists of history notwithstanding.

 

As a rule, our conferences are attended by representatives of the Administration of the President of the Russian Federation, Parliament, and Government of Russia. We are visited by official representatives of Russian Orthodox Church (since 1997 they have had an observer status). The Chairman of the Russian Council of Muftis, the Chief Rabbi of Russia, and top administrators of Russian Catholics and Protestants are the vice-presidents of IRLA Euro-Asia Chapter. Among the members of our Council there are leaders of new religious movements.

 

We are learning themselves and demonstrate others that it is possible, while being faithful to own religion, not to fight but to cooperate with each other in the name of Him, Who created all visible and invisible things.

 

May the Lord help each of us!