Tag Archives: Country: Russia

AP: Russia is on its way to formally prohibiting all adoption by same-sex couples and also banning the adoption of Russian children by single people or unmarried couples from countries that allow same-sex marriage.

Independent: Russia’s parliament will debate a controversial law on Tuesday that could see people arrested for behaviour that is deemed to promote homosexuality.

Washington Times: Moscow police detained 300 Muslims after President Vladimir Putin ordered a crackdown on radical Islamists ahead of next year’s Winter Olympics in Sochi.

RT.com: The Russian President has told reporters he was very tired of their persistent interest in his attitude to same sex marriage, but promised to support the ban on adoptions by foreign same sex couples if parliament approves it.

Forum 18: Hundreds of religious communities across Russia are among non-governmental organisations (NGOs) inspected by officials, Forum 18 News Service has found. Check-ups ranged from a simple telephone request for documents to multiple, extensive searches. It “wasn’t simply the initiative of the Prosecutor”, Moscow-based lawyer Konstantin Andreyev told Forum 18. “There’s a political subtext.”

Volokh Conspiracy: Lenta.ru so reports. The bill would criminalize “actions in public, demonstrating clear disrespect to society and committed with the intent to insult the religious feelings of believers,”

Voice of Russia: Roger Kishka, senior lawyer, Alliance Defending Freedom and Andrea Williams, chairman, Christian Concern – UK evalute the consequences of recent Council’s of Europe Parliamentary Assembly resolution devoted to religious freedom.

RT.com: The head of the Upper Chamber, Valentina Matviyenko, told President Putin that the Russian Foreign Ministry was already working on changes to the adoption agreement with France.

Breitbart.com: President Vladimir Putin on Friday said Russia could change its agreements for the adoption of Russian children with France and other Western states that are legalising gay marriage.

Tech Crunch: Governments, even democracies, are not always fans of transparency. According to Google’s brand new transparency report, “government attempts to censor content on Google services has grown”, doubling since the second half of 2012 (1,054 requests vs. 2,285). Brazil took the gold medal of the censorship olympics, with 697 requests, while the United States took 2nd place, with 321 requests.

Religion Clause Blog: USCIRF wants the U.S. to question violations of religious freedom and human rights in Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Russia, Azerbaijan, and Bangladesh.

Turtle Bay and Beyond: French parents who wish to pass on certain values to their children will clash in the coming months over the Republic’s education system, which the current Government wishes to reform, particularly in relation to the complementary …

Breitbart: I consider the phenomenon called feminism very dangerous,” said the powerful Patriarch Kirill in a speech delivered Tuesday and posted Wednesday on the official Russian Orthodox Church website. “Feminist organisations proclaim a pseudo-freedom of women, which should be manifested outside marriage and family.”

World Bulletin: Russians who convert to Islam are subjected to a variety of persecution and torture by the Russian administration and security forces, according to reports.

Globe and Mail: Russian legislators have given initial approval to a law that would make offences against religion punishable by up to five years in prison after the Pussy Riot protest in Moscow’s main cathedral outraged many in the mainly Orthodox country.

Catholic Culture: Metropolitan Hilarion, the Russian Orthodox Church’s chief ecumenical officer, has urged the new Archbishop of Canterbury not to support female bishops or same-sex marriage.

Religion Clause Blog: Representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church met in Rome to discuss cooperation in promoting family values, social services and care for the poor, the Moscow Patriarchate said on Wednesday.

Religion Clause Blog: The New York Times yesterday reported on the controversy that has been set loose in Stavropol, a region in Russia at the edge of the Caucasus mountain range . . .

Guardian: The outcome document of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) must not undermine previous agreements that put women’s sexual and reproductive rights central to their empowerment, the head of the UN development programme said on Wednesday.

Turtle Bay and Beyond: As the 57th session of the Commission on the Status of Women begins today, two news stories are already disingenuously implying that the Holy See, the Russian Federation, and Iran are effectively enablers of violence committed against women. These and several other UN member states oppose the inclusion of language that could be used to support a right to abortion – a topic that is always controversial within the UN system.

AP: Responding to Dutch assertions that the legislation may be contrary to Russia’s international obligations, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said there . . .

Lela Gilbert at Patheos: A few days ago a chilling video appeared on BBC’s website, relating the story of a Coptic Christian man, Victor Schata-Michael, who had fled Egypt with his wife and children because of religious persecution. Schata-Michael was desperate to save his family from dangers that increasingly threaten Egypt’s Coptic community, comprised of 8-10 million Christians.

AFP on Google: Russia expressed “serious worry” Wednesday over the fate of a Russian boy adopted by an American woman who did not reveal that she is a lesbian, Moscow’s latest broadside in a growing war of words over adoption.

De Spiegel: Moscow is currently seeking to make “homosexual propaganda” a prosecutable offense. But in Germany, Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle has warned Russia’s ambassador that the new legislation could aggravate European-Russian relations.

RT.com: The Russian Lower House has passed at the first reading a bill banning homosexual propaganda towards minors, which has already been labeled by opponents as anti-gay. The bill was supported by 388 MPs with one vote against and one abstentio

AP: Militant Orthodox activists have attacked members of Russia’s embattled gay community protesting against a planned law banning “gay propaganda”.

Russian Legal Information Agency: A Californian court has announced the verdict in a custody case involving a Russian child adopted by an American same-sex couple, the Russian Legal Information Agency (RAPSI/rapsinews.com) reports on Monday, citing a copy of the court order.

AP: The legislation being pushed by the Kremlin and the Russian Orthodox Church would make it illegal nationwide to provide minors with information that is defined as “propaganda of sodomy, lesbianism, bisexuality and transgenderism.”

AP: Russia’s ombudsman for children’s rights sought on Thursday to reassure American would-be adoptive parents that they will be allowed to take their children back to the United States. But some Americans with court rulings in their favor say they’re still in legal limbo.

Rasmussen: A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that just 18% of American Adults think the current level of difficulty to adopt in this country is about right. Forty-four percent (44%) feel it is too hard to adopt a child here. Only five percent (5%) believe it’s too easy.

The Blog of the Legal Times: A Washington federal judge today ordered the Russian government to pay $50,000 for each day officials refuse to comply with a court order calling for the return of Jewish religious texts seized in the early twentieth century.

Religion Clause Blog: In remarks published last Sunday, the eve of Christmas in the Russian Orthodox calendar, Patriarch Kirill, head of the Russian Orthodox Church, urged the Russian government to take a careful approach in new legislation to respond to insults against religion

Baptist Press: Russia’s ban on adoptions by American parents, considered a retaliatory response to U.S. sanctions against Russia for human rights abuses, will instead punish vulnerable orphans languishing in the foreign country, Christians at the forefront of the issue fear.

Moscow Times: President Vladimir Putin on Monday signed new legislation prescribing norms for all levels of education and setting new rules for teachers’ salaries and school fees, a statement on the Kremlin’s website said.

Catholic Culture: Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin, the chief foreign-affairs spokesman for the Moscow patriarchate, said that it would be unjust to send orphans abroad because “they won’t get a truly Christian upbringing.”

AP: resident Vladimir Putin says a draft bill banning U.S. adoptions of Russian children is a legitimate response to a new U.S. law that calls for sanctions on Russians deemed to be human rights violators. But he has not committed to signing it.

Interfax: The share of Orthodox believers in the country has dropped by 6%, from 80% in 2009, while the share of Muslims has grown by 3% to 7% in the same period.

AP: Russia’s parliament on Wednesday gave overwhelming preliminary approval to a measure banning Americans from adopting Russian children, a harsh retaliatory move against U.S. human rights legislation.

AP: Russia’s foreign minister on Tuesday strongly criticized a proposal in the country’s parliament that would ban Americans from adopting Russian children.

C-FAM: A UN committee of legal experts reprimanded the Russian Federation last month for allowing the Ryazan province of Russia to enforce a law that bans the promotion of homosexuality among minors as part of a national effort to protect children from early sexualization, and related adverse health consequences.

RT.com: “A certain control over homosexual behavior is necessary in a democratic society,” says a senior Russian MP as the State Duma prepares a bill on the nationwide ban of gay ‘propaganda’. The first parliamentary reading on the draft federal law prohibiting “homosexual propaganda” is scheduled for December 19.

NCPA Policy Digest: Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS) have started to plan their own development bank, as well as a bailout fund to help many countries around the world. This is done in response to the growing dissatisfaction of Western banking institutions like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), says The Diplomat.

Voice of America: Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a new law expanding the definition of treason, a move critics say gives the government broad authority to brand anyone a traitor.

Steve Elwart at WorldNetDaily: The hope of several countries is that they can expand the ITU’s jurisdiction to the Internet, replacing the current governing system with one that is controlled by a U.N. bureaucracy. The member nations will also consider an “Internet tax” designed to collect money from more affluent nations and redistribute it to poorer nations to improve their Internet infrastructure. ITRs do not currently include regulation of the Internet within their jurisdiction, since they have not been revised since the beginning of the Internet communications era.

Boston Globe: A box in which parents can leave their babies anonymously without any legal risk opened Wednesday in a town in northwestern Russia — part of an effort that activists hope will save many young lives.

Reuters: Gunmen shot dead a Muslim religious leader in Russia’s Dagestan region on Tuesday in an attack likely to worsen a spiral of militant violence that threatens Moscow’s hold on the restive North Caucasus.

Voice of America: As gray winter skies descend on Moscow, Russians are adjusting to a political winter. Since taking office nearly six months ago, President Vladimir Putin has methodically reduced civic space in Russia by advocating new laws on treason, blasphemy, libel, Internet censorship and curbs on public protest.

Benjamin Bull at Townhall: Since Roe v. Wade legalized abortion in January 1973, more than 55 million babies have been aborted in America. If a number like “55 million” is hard to grasp, think of it this way—if you added together the populations of New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, Philadelphia, Phoenix, San Antonio, San Diego, Dallas, Jacksonville, Indianapolis, and San Francisco, you would only have about 26.1 million people—less than half the number aborted.

B92.net: Russia’s Supreme Court on Wednesday declared legal the prohibition of propaganda of homosexuality and pedophilia among minors.

Religion Clause Blog: Russia’s Duma is considering amendments to the country’s criminal code to specifically outlaw causing of religious offense.

AP: A court in Moscow ruled Monday that an anti-Islam film that has sparked violent demonstrations around the world can no longer be shown in Russia.

Baptist Press: An isolated incident? A misunderstanding? Analysts watching the current climate in the former Cold War country don’t think so: “This destruction of the church is about as concrete of evidence as you can get that something very bad and very troubling is taking place,” said Katrina Lantos Swett, chair of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. “This could not have happened without the backing, support, and implicit blessing of the police.”

Fox News: Communications Minister Nikolai Nikiforov wrote on Twitter Tuesday that access to the online video sharing site will be blocked in Russia if its owner, Google, fails to abide by a court order banning the showing of the film that was produced in the U.S. and mocks Muslims and the prophet Muhammad.

Radio Free Europe: Russia’s Supreme Court has ruled that a controversial ban on gay propaganda does not extend to public demonstrations and discussions of gay rights.

ChristianPersecution.info: A congregation of evangelical Christians in Russia’s capital Moscow were without a church building Tuesday, September 11, after workers with bulldozers and other equipment destroyed their Holy Trinity Pentecostal Church complex, protected by local police, witnesses said.

Reuters: Russia’s most senior Islamic cleric warned on Wednesday that civil war could break out in the southern region of Dagestan after a moderate Muslim cleric was killed in a suicide bombing that has heightened religious tensions.

Chloe Breyer at the NY Times: A central charge against the three members of the Pussy Riot punk-rock band who were recently sentenced to two years in prison was “inciting religious hatred.” This they are said to have done by briefly dancing at the front of Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Savior and splicing footage of their dance into a video critical of President Vladimir Putin.

RT.com: Four Orthodox Christian crosses have been chopped down in different parts of Russia. The incidents come after the Femen movement attacked a cross in Kiev to protest the sentence of the punk band Pussy Riot, who received two years in prison.

Religion Clause Blog: According to Interfax today, in Russia, Orthodox Christian activists have physically attacked Moscow’s Erotic Art Museum on the Arbat.

Reuters: “They stop at nothing – they kill people of the same faith and religious leaders, bring evil and spill blood during religious holidays,” Putin said in Bolgar, a settlement in Tatarstan where Islam is considered to have been adopted as an official religion for the first time in Russia in 922.

Jurist: The Court of Appeal of Singapore [official website] ruled [judgment, PDF] Tuesday that a man charged with gross indecency under a provision of the penal code criminalizing sexual acts between men can proceed with a constitutional challenge against the law in court . . .

NPR: Authorities in Russia fear that Muslim radicals are grasping for power in the central Russian republic of Tatarstan. Analysts say the radicals have infiltrated Tatarstan’s Muslim establishment, seeking to undermine the moderate Islam that has co-existed with Christianity for centuries.

Interfax: The Moscow City Court has again upheld a ban on gay pride parades in Moscow for the next 100 years. Gay pride parade organizers intend to contest the decision.

BBC: Moscow’s top court has upheld a ban on gay pride marches in the Russian capital for the next 100 years.

C-FAM Friday Fax: Traditional Values Resolution Hijacked at Human Rights Council in Geneva

But the United States and some European countries objected that the rights of women and homosexual and transgender persons are frequently undermined by traditional values and religion, and that something should be said in the study about the conflict. The International Lesbian and Gay Association (ILGA) joined the criticisms.

LifeSiteNews: The Russian punk rock band “Pussy Riot,” currently on trial for desecrating Moscow’s Christ the Savior Cathedral, is being elevated by Western elites and media outlets to the status of a human rights icon.

Religion Clause Blog: Two commissioners of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom on Tuesday published anop-ed in the Moscow Times– Russia’s only daily English language  newspaper– highly critical of Russia’s policies on religious liberty. USCIRF Chair, Katrina Lantos Swett, and USCIRF Commissioner Robert George said in part:

Reuters: Moderate Muslims in Tatarstan blame the violence on the arrival of radical groups, such as followers of Sunni Islam’s strict Salafi movement and the outlawed organization Hizb ut-Tahrir which seeks an Islamic caliphate.

World Net Daily: Russian intelligence has information that U.S. troops are in Turkey near the country’s border with Syria, a senior Syrian official told WND today.

Religion Clause Blog: Interfax yesterday reported on a court hearing for Maria Alyokhina, one of the defendants. Alyokhina told the court: . . . As a representative of my generation, I have other questions about the relations between the church and the state, to which I sincerely want to get answers from Father Kirill and count on his wisdom. I thought that the church loves its children, but it turns out that there is a division here, and the church only loves those children who believe in Putin.

AP: A bare-breasted feminist activist bearing a threatening message on her body tried to attack the Russian Orthodox Church’s leader Thursday to protest alleged anti-Ukrainian policies by the church and the Kremlin.

CNSNews: Villagers in Russia’s south Urals have stumbled upon a gruesome discovery — four barrels containing 248 human fetuses left in a forest.

Forum 18: Use of Russia’s Extremism Law against those with views the authorities dislike – especially Muslims who study the works of Said Nursi, and Jehovah’s Witnesses – has mushroomed under both Presidents Vladimir Putin and Dmitri Medvedev. This is the most threatening recent development for freedom of religion or belief in the Russian Federation, Forum 18 News Service notes in its survey of “extremism”-related violations.

Routledge: This book presents a comprehensive overview of religious policy in Russia since the end of the communist regime, exposing many of the ambiguities and uncertainties about the position of religion in Russian life. | Hat tip: Religion Clause Blog

Reuters: Russian authorities said they detained five suspects on Friday over attacks that wounded the top Islamic official in the mostly Muslim Tatarstan region, killed his deputy and raised fears of the spread of militancy to Russia’s heartland.