We talked for two hours on Zoom. It was our first meeting, and we were both nervous. I first told her about myself, and it seemed as if Katerina was interviewing me. My motives and views, and my attitude towards Jehovah’s Witnesses were important to her. And only at the end of the first hour did we switch roles: we opened up to each other, and Katerina entrusted us with her story.

Do no harm

– Tell us about yourself. What made you decide to conduct interviews?

– In 2021 we organized the Yakunin Freedom of Conscience Committee to raise our voices in defense of freedom of religion, like the priest Gleb Yakunin (1934-2014), about whom I wrote the book, The Mighty Gleb: The Most Outlawed Priest Yakunin (2021). I recently had the idea of recording conversations with women who are Jehovah’s Witnesses. No one ordered these interviews, no one is behind me, if that is what concerns you.

Let’s put it this way: You are Witnesses for Jehovah, and I am a witness to terror. There are not many living testimonies of persecution. Few outsiders treat Jehovah’s Witnesses with understanding and sympathy. This is primarily the result of anti-sect slander, which many have believed, and they often repeat these negative myths as if it’s their own opinion. Also, during persecution you don’t trust everybody, which is also understandable.

– Is this interview for gathering information?

– I don’t really understand how information can be separated from the inner person and the personality of an individual. Currently there is a lot of dry information about repression, including information about Jehovah’s Witnesses. There are also statements in your defense. We recently published such a statement from the Yakunin Freedom of Conscience Committee.¹“They are not extremists!” Statement by the Yakunin Committee in defense of persecuted Jehovah’s Witnesses https://credo.press/239610/. “For state policy regarding Jehovah’s Witnesses to return to the realm of legality the following is necessary: to end all criminal prosecutions, release and rehabilitate Jehovah’s Witnesses convicted for their beliefs, compensating for the harm they suffered; to resume registration of religious communities of Jehovah’s Witnesses in the Russian Federation; to register a centralized religious organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses; to restore the property of Jehovah’s Witnesses that was appropriated by the Russian Federation as authorized by the April 20, 2017 decision of the Supreme Court.” https://www.rightsinrussia.org/statement-9/ Before that, there was a petition from a group called Christian Action,²“Stop persecuting Jehovah’s Witnesses!” An open petition of the Christian Action movement –https://hrwf.eu/russia-freedom-of-religion-or-belief-special-bimonthly-forb-digest-16-31-10-2021/ whose members protested in support of the Witnesses. People in the human rights community talk and write about you. And not only about you: there is hideous persecution of the Islamic party Hizb ut-Tahrir³“On the inhumane sentences against Crimean Tatars accused of links to Hizb ut-Tahrir.” Statement of the Yakunin Committee URL:https://credo.press/239548/ (dated November 11, 2021). “The Islamic Liberation Party” (Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islami) was recognized in 2003 by the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation as a terrorist organization, the decision dated February 14, 2003, № GKPI 03-116, entered into force on March 4, 2003. According to data from the Memorial Human Rights Center, as of November 30, 2021, at least 332 people were being prosecuted in connection with their involvement with Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islami. 218 of them have been convicted: 74 received sentences of 10 to 15 years and 88 received sentences of 15 to 24 years.– members can be given up to 24 years in prison and the term can be extended. Other religious groups are also persecuted – with searches, detentions, and court cases.

What is important is not just information about you, but your personality and your voice, so that Katerina’s words come to life. It is important how you personally experienced the persecution – your personal suffering because you are martyrs, suffering disciples.

– Like Stephen in his day (Acts chapters 6-8).

– Yes. Jehovah’s Witnesses suffer for their faith. I heard that you were under house arrest for 500 days. Please tell me about that.

– That’s what is unique about my story, that’s what makes it different from most of the others. But right away I want to say that personally I don’t hate those who persecuted me. I understand that this persecution was foretold in the Bible. It is recorded in the Second Letter to Timothy 3:12: “In fact, all those desiring to live with godly devotion in association with Christ Jesus will also be persecuted.” And I’m prepared to talk only about myself.

– Of course. We understand very well the overall situation in which we are having this conversation, and our first rule should be “Do no harm,” – not to ourselves or to others. We think of others first.

– Exactly.

My name is branded: “Jehovah’s Witness”

– Why do they persecute Witnesses? That’s the question everyone’s asking. What is your answer?

– Simply because I am one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. That’s all. Just for the name. What did they seize from me during the search on October 3, 2019? Everything that had “Jehovah” written on it or had any reference to Bible texts. Throughout the entire court proceeding, I saw that all it took to charge me was to say that I am one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. In that they see a connection with the Administrative Center of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Russia and the Yoshkar-Ola Local Religious Organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses. That’s it, in the eyes of the prosecutor’s office I am a criminal – an extremist without extremism.

To be one of Jehovah’s Witnesses and to bear this name is not a crime; it is something to be proud of! The phrase “I am one of Jehovah’s Witnesses” is like a brand stamped on my name. I am proud to wear this emblem. I wrote a poem about it and read it in court. Here is a verse from it:

I’m not an extremist! Not a criminal!

No thief or crook am I!

I’m not a fanatic, not an apostate!

I’ve accepted the brand mark of Christ!

Although it has been said in court sessions that reading and studying the Bible, praying to Jehovah God, singing songs of praise to my God Jehovah, wanting to tell people about God, and worshipping peacefully at meetings with friends are extremist actions, they are not! These actions are religious, and they are as vital to me as air.

Matthew 10:17-18 records Jesus’ words, “They will hand you over to local courts. And you will be brought before governors and kings for my sake, for a witness to them.”

– Of course, the charges of extremism are absurd. Let’s go back to the search. You say they seized all the materials that mentioned Jehovah or references to the Bible. Did they take away a lot of literature?

– The search was conducted in three places. Afterward, the investigation didn’t include one of the searches as evidence; another was conducted at my registered place of residence, where I haven’t lived for 15 years.

They didn’t confiscate any literature from me personally at my actual place of residence; they took my laptop and phone, an electronic media storage device with songs, cards from friends, a bank card, SIM cards, and the materials I use for personal Bible study and for studying the Hill Mari language.

For example, I had a notebook in which I wrote down my thoughts from my Bible research. And it had the name of God Jehovah written in it, for example, a reference to Matthew 5:3, and so on. I consider this an invasion of my privacy because it was my notebook for improving my Christian personality.

– Did you analyze your day in the notebook? Did you record your weaknesses, your mistakes, your sins? I remember Benjamin Franklin and Leo Tolstoy did that. Franklin even made a table in which he noted his mistakes every day.

– No, but, for example, I wrote about prayer – what I needed to correct to improve my prayers. Also, every year I wrote down my goals, both spiritual and practical. After one year, I wrote down the results: what I had achieved and what I hadn’t. Apart from my goals, I wrote down blessings: reasons to rejoice and how my God is blessing me. The notebook was quite thick, as I had been writing down my research on Bible principles for years. When they took it away from me, it felt as if they were taking a piece of my heart.

– Like trampling on your heart with dirty boots. I understand.

– Yes, it was an intrusion into my inner life as a Christian.

– It’s also a gross violation of personal boundaries.

– Yes, Elena. And they took the cards from my friends simply because “Jehovah” was written on them. They took cards that were given to me after April 21, 2017, and if there was no date, they took them away no matter how long ago I received them. In that way they sent me a clear message – before April 20, 2017, I could still be one of Jehovah’s Witnesses; but after April 20, 2017, I supposedly became an extremist. An extremist post-factum.

– Did you get your notebooks back?

– No. They didn’t even return my devices: not my laptop or my phone. They explained that they would keep them with the case materials.

– What does your lawyer say?

– My lawyer is busy now with a cassation appeal in connection with the resolution of the Supreme Court Plenum of October 28, 2021; he is also writing about the devices. I’ve heard that other defendants are getting their devices back; but in my case, the investigator and the courts have been merciless with me.

The TV is watching you

– Have you been asked to renounce your faith?

– No.

– In what way have they been merciless with you?

– According to their plan, the detention center and the lengthy house arrest were supposed to crush my spirit.

– I read that you were the only one in Mari El who was brought to trial; are you the only woman or the only Witness?

– The only Jehovah’s Witness.

– A prisoner of conscience. And how did they spy on you?

– Based on a court order, they installed a recording device in my TV three times, for 90 days each. And between February and August of 2019, they made audio recordings and one video recording where I was… in my underwear. The video was shown in court. The videotape had no meetings for worship on it.

– When you were watching TV, it was watching you?

– Maybe, but I hardly ever watched it. I don’t know. The absurdity of it is that I was accused of organizing the Yoshkar-Ola Local Religious Organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses (Article 282.2(1) of the RF CrC) at a time when I was living in the town of Kozmodemyansk. How could I have founded a local religious organization in one city while living somewhere else? And besides, a woman cannot conduct meetings for worship. And the case materials say that I allegedly organized listening to recordings and prayers – I didn’t conduct meetings, but I organized listening to video recordings.

– Was there a secret witness in your case?

– There was a secret witness for the prosecution – “Petrova,” who, by the way, admitted that at the meetings of Jehovah’s Witnesses only peaceful topics were discussed. According to another witness for the prosecution, at the meetings for worship people talked about God, and I never called on those present to commit illegal acts, as the investigation and the state prosecutor claimed; in the end they demanded a sentence of seven years in a penal colony for me.

None of the witnesses said that I had a negative attitude toward other religions or that I said anything negative about them or their religion.

Forty-eight holidays

– How many court sessions were there in nine months?

– Forty-eight, if you also count the sessions to decide on preventive measures, which were held over a period of almost two years minus one month.

– Forty-eight!

– I view that in a positive light. I had forty-eight days to give a witness that I was not an extremist, but a follower of Christ and one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. It was like a holiday for me – a chance to speak about my faith!

– Are we turning the court into a pulpit?

– Into a witness. In court I was able to tell many people about my religious beliefs, which are incompatible with extremism, and about my true motives for worshipping God. I had a great opportunity to tell the court staff about my God Jehovah, about my faith, and about how my views are incompatible with religious hatred and intolerance.

I felt like an old woman

– How did you survive house arrest? After all, the rented apartment that was your home became a prison.

– I felt like an old woman who can’t leave the house and has to wait for others to help her. It was very difficult, and it severely affected my psychological well-being. I suddenly turned into a helpless being. I am a young woman, I like to go to the beauty salon, for example, and there are many other places I like to visit. I couldn’t earn my own living, buy food or items for personal hygiene, take out the garbage, or buy clothes or shoes. I couldn’t make appointments at medical facilities for myself, buy medicine, or call a plumber or an electrician when something broke down at home, I couldn’t send or receive correspondence or take my cat to the vet; I couldn’t drive my car, and there were many other things I could not do… And finally, I was denied the opportunity to go to see my beloved mother – I am her only child – to help her take care of my elderly bedridden grandmother, who is 88 years old.

Those five hundred days of arrest were very traumatic. Now I’m having to see a psychologist.

– Well done for accepting help from a psychologist. You have a modern approach to medicine.

– Thank you. When I was under house arrest, I was able to get permission to visit healthcare facilities. That wasn’t easy, it took a lot of persistence, but I got that permission, and I saw doctors about two or three times a month.

It’s as though those nearly two years of house arrest dropped out of my life. It’s very difficult to go back to my previous normal life. For example, at first, I was confused about how to use money, it was hard to decide where to shop and what to buy. The simplest things overwhelmed me. Such an experience requires a long rehabilitation and recovery.

– They detained you on the street?

– Because I worked as a housekeeper, the law enforcement agency decided to call me on the phone, pretending to offer me a cleaning job, to start at 1 p.m. I figured that it would take about twenty minutes to get to the place by car. I left home at twenty of one. It was very quiet, no one was around; then suddenly a man came running toward me yelling:
“Stop! Stop! Stop!” and pushed me up against a tree. My first thought was that it was a training drill. Since I haven’t ever committed a crime and had no thoughts of doing so, I was caught completely off guard – it seemed like a prank.

– What a nightmare!

– Just at that moment, a crowd of men appeared. An investigator was in front. And one girl was there as a witness. Even in the temporary detention facility and the pretrial detention center, I still thought that it was a prank, and that any minute someone would say, “Katya, we were joking!” My mind just couldn’t accept the reality.

– A state of denial – that’s understandable. It was hard to get out of that. Let’s return to the house arrest. What were you supposed to live on? You couldn’t work, could you? House arrest for a single person – isn’t that a death sentence? Who bought your groceries? Who rented the apartment? In prison they provide food, but what if you are under house arrest? Does the government take responsibility for your need to survive while locked up alone?

– No one cares about that. For example, I had a toothache. What could I do? I couldn’t call an ambulance, could I? My mother helped me with groceries. She lives in the countryside; she brought me potatoes, carrots, honey, and other things. My friends helped me. It is very hard to be isolated for a long period of time; I couldn’t even take a walk. Five hundred days without a walk.

– In Soviet times, dissidents used to walk for kilometers in their cells – from the door to the window.

– And I ran around my apartment; it was a blessing that Jehovah God helped me with that. The apartment I lived in wasn’t expensive, but it was big.

– Did the owners of the apartment know that you were under house arrest?

– They had to extend the lease on the apartment, even though they were planning to sell it.

– How could they put you under house arrest if you didn’t have your own home?

– It wasn’t my decision. I spent 105 days in pre-trial detention and expected to spend more than a year there, as the investigation required. But one day my lawyer came and said that they wanted to transfer me to house arrest. But I had nowhere to live! My mother was taking care of my grandmother and couldn’t rent an apartment. What to do? My friends helped me out. They did everything without me. I sat in my cell and prayed, what else could I do! The court session only lasted fifteen minutes, and they released me under house arrest. An apartment was found. It was the same apartment where they had previously conducted the search – where I was arrested. These are Jehovah’s miracles. There have been many of them over the past two years.

The Bible says at Psalm 37:25, “I was once young and now I am old, but I have not seen anyone righteous abandoned, nor his children looking for bread.” And I wasn’t abandoned either, or destitute. I am very thankful to everyone. I couldn’t have gotten through it on my own.

I feel no hatred or hostility

– The law enforcement agencies saw that I was a fragile girl and thought that I would be easy to break, that I would turn everyone in. But they came up against a wall that nothing could break. They tried to break me in various ways, both in the detention center and under house arrest. And even now it continues.

– Do they really not understand that you are not a criminal?

– The investigator once told me: “Katerina, I have caught real extremists.” And I replied, “That means I’m not a real extremist?!” I have to give them credit – they were quite polite with me. Individually they weren’t mean.

When I was leaving, I even said to the investigator when we were alone: “Thank you very much for putting pressure on me. It may seem strange, but I am grateful to you for that; it has made my faith even stronger.” And he just lowered his eyes. He had nothing to say.

To be honest, I feel very sorry for them. Compared to them, I am a free person. They have restricted me with certain punitive measures, but I’m free to say what I think and do what I want, but they have to keep doing that work. They have become victims of their circumstances: one was appointed as a prosecutor, another as a judge and a third as an investigator. I still have warm feelings toward these people, I feel no hatred or hostility. I realize that they just have to do their job.

– But they’re not being thrown to the lions. They could leave a job like that.

– I realize that they treated me badly. I faced cruelty, betrayal, and slanderous gossip about me. The only victims in this criminal case are me, my mother, and my elderly, sick, bedridden grandmother. We have suffered significant harm – to our property, and to our physical, emotional, and mental health, as well as to our reputation. But I know that everything is in God’s hands and he alone is the just judge, as it says in the Book of Isaiah 33:22: “For Jehovah is our Judge.”

– Isn’t justice on earth important to you? Aren’t they personally accountable for their actions?

– I believe that only God’s Kingdom can bring about real justice. Jehovah is their judge; I would rather be their lawyer.

The final statement has its own melody

– The trial was in Yoshkar-Ola?

– It was in Kozmodemyansk. I was taken there from Yoshkar-Ola.

– I have friends who live in Kozmodemyansk. They call their town Kuzma.

– Wow! Have you been to Kuzma?

– Yes, I have flown through Cheboksary several times. Are you Mari?

– I’m Meadow Mari. I came to Yoshkar-Ola in 2015 and started learning Meadow Mari and then Hill Mari.

– My friends are Hill Mari. Is the movement for the revival of national culture among the Mari people weak?

– It’s just starting to develop.

– I was shocked when I learned that during Soviet times, Mari children from villages were forced to go to a Russian-speaking school even though they didn’t know the Russian language.

I imagined little children being brought to a foreign school where they couldn’t understand what the teachers were saying, so the Mari-speaking teacher had to whisper the lesson to them in their native language during breaks. And even now, Mari people sometimes still whisper to each other in their native language.

And I really like the sound of the Hill Mari language. It’s as if they’re singing; the voice rises at the end of the sentence. Melody is essential to a language. Every language has its own music (Now I speak with a Mari intonation). I asked my Mari friends to sing me a song in their native language. They sang it and translated it.

In the sky the stars are shining,

One is brighter than the others.

Star, why do you shine without smiling?

Light without warmth is not light.

That’s Mari wisdom. And they draw out the last word, and their voices rise; it has its own melody. The last word is separate from the rest – this is true for syntax, and also in court. Tell us about your “last word” in court.

– I’m very glad you like Mari culture. In court I began by saying that when I hear the phrase “last word,” I automatically think of the words in the New Testament at 2 Timothy 3:2-4: “Know this, that in the last days critical times hard to deal with will be here,” and then it lists many negative qualities of people, such as pride, haughtiness, cruelty, betrayal, boastfulness, and also the spreading of slander. “Critical times” have come in my life as well.

At the same time, I thanked everyone in court, because in the detention center I spoke not only with the prisoners, but also with the staff and wardens. All of the wardens – as well as the prosecutor’s office – knew that the person held in the detention center was one of Jehovah’s Witnesses, not a criminal. When I went to medical facilities, I told people about my beloved Friend, Jehovah. When I was under house arrest, I told relatives, plumbers, locksmiths, electricians, and neighbors about my God Jehovah. Servants of God in any situation, under any circumstance, will find a way to speak about their God, Jehovah. No one and nothing can make me renounce my faith. No matter where I am, I will always speak about my God, Friend, and Father, Jehovah.

– In their final statement, Jehovah’s Witnesses often compare their persecution in modern times to Nazi and Soviet persecution. Did you speak about this?

– I referred to Operation North in 1951.⁴Operation North was the code name for the operation by the Soviet Ministry of State Security to forcibly relocate Jehovah’s Witnesses and their family members living in Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia to Siberia. The operation was carried out on April 1 and 2, 1951. In total, more than 10,000 people were sent into exile “for eternity.” In 1965, in accordance with Decree № 4020-1U of September 30, 1965 of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, the restrictions concerning special resettlement were removed from Jehovah’s Witnesses and they were released from administrative supervision. During the years of exile, the number of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Siberia increased significantly. That brutal deportation took a heavy toll on the lives of Jehovah’s Witnesses in those days. I am proud of them. They are an example to me of how to endure all the hardships of a criminal case. Of course, it’s painful for me to talk about what happened to my fellow believers. When I think about it, tears come to my eyes… But now there are so many Jehovah’s Witnesses in Siberia! I have received encouraging letters even from children and grandchildren of those whom the state recognized as victims of repression. They know firsthand what religious persecution is like because their families have personally experienced it. They were the first and foremost sources of encouragement for me when I was in pretrial detention, because they know and understand what it is like. I thank them for that!

Something similar to what happened in the Soviet Union is now happening in Russia. Just as Jehovah’s Witnesses were accused of anti-Soviet activity under Article 70 of the CrC of the RSFSR in the past, they now are accused of extremist activity under Article 282.2 of the RF CrC. But none of the accused Jehovah’s Witnesses, including myself, have committed the crimes in this article; this article is being used by those trying to frame us.

I am a law-abiding citizen of the Russian Federation; I haven’t incited anyone to violence. The only connection between me as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses and violence is that I have become a victim of violence! My conscience is clear before God, before the state, and before people.

– Do you have to report somewhere now?

– Twice a month in three different registers. I was given a six and a half year suspended sentence, restriction of freedom, and prohibition from holding religious office for five years. I don’t know what that was about, because I have never had any positions, and the whole thing is nonsensical, because, as Jesus said, “… do not you be called teachers, for one is your Teacher – Christ – and all of you are brothers.”

– Counting your pretrial detention and house arrest, how much time do you have left?

– With a suspended sentence, neither pretrial detention nor house arrest is taken into account. If a suspended sentence were to be turned into a prison sentence, then the time would be taken into account.

– We’ll hope for the best. Get well and recover. I wish you, your mother, and your grandmother well. Give them my regards. They can be proud of you. How do you say “thank you” in Mari?

– Kugu tau.

– Kugu tau!

November 20, 2021

• 1
  “They are not extremists!” Statement by the Yakunin Committee in defense of persecuted Jehovah’s Witnesses https://credo.press/239610/. “For state policy regarding Jehovah’s Witnesses to return to the realm of legality the following is necessary: to end all criminal prosecutions, release and rehabilitate Jehovah’s Witnesses convicted for their beliefs, compensating for the harm they suffered; to resume registration of religious communities of Jehovah’s Witnesses in the Russian Federation; to register a centralized religious organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses; to restore the property of Jehovah’s Witnesses that was appropriated by the Russian Federation as authorized by the April 20, 2017 decision of the Supreme Court.” https://www.rightsinrussia.org/statement-9/ ↩︎
• 2
  “Stop persecuting Jehovah’s Witnesses!” An open petition of the Christian Action movement –https://hrwf.eu/russia-freedom-of-religion-or-belief-special-bimonthly-forb-digest-16-31-10-2021/ ↩︎
• 3
  “On the inhumane sentences against Crimean Tatars accused of links to Hizb ut-Tahrir.” Statement of the Yakunin Committee URL:https://credo.press/239548/ (dated November 11, 2021). “The Islamic Liberation Party” (Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islami) was recognized in 2003 by the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation as a terrorist organization, the decision dated February 14, 2003, № GKPI 03-116, entered into force on March 4, 2003. According to data from the Memorial Human Rights Center, as of November 30, 2021, at least 332 people were being prosecuted in connection with their involvement with Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islami. 218 of them have been convicted: 74 received sentences of 10 to 15 years and 88 received sentences of 15 to 24 years. ↩︎
• 4
  Operation North was the code name for the operation by the Soviet Ministry of State Security to forcibly relocate Jehovah’s Witnesses and their family members living in Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia to Siberia. The operation was carried out on April 1 and 2, 1951. In total, more than 10,000 people were sent into exile “for eternity.” In 1965, in accordance with Decree № 4020-1U of September 30, 1965 of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, the restrictions concerning special resettlement were removed from Jehovah’s Witnesses and they were released from administrative supervision. During the years of exile, the number of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Siberia increased significantly. ↩︎