RUSSIA RELIGION NEWS





Ulianovsk Jehovah's Witnesses fail in attempt to give property to Portuguese coreligionists

PROPERTY PREVIOUSLY BELONGING TO LOCAL JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES TRANSFERRED TO STATE OWNERSHIP IN ULIANOVSK

Interfax-Religiia, 31 July 2018

A court in Ulianovsk converted to ownership by the Russian Federation a large object of real estate, which previously belonged to representatives of the forbidden association of Jehovah's Witnesses.

"In 2017, the local religious organization of Jehovah's Witnesses transferred without payment, within the framework of a donation agreement, a nonresidential building of an area of more than 200 square meters on Pushkarev Street to the Association of Jehovah's Witnesses of the republic of Portugal," the prosecutor's office of Ulianovsk oblast reported on Tuesday [31 July].

The prosecutor's office recalls that previously the Russian Supreme Court granted the plaintiff's petition of the Russian Ministry of Justice for the liquidation of the organization of Jehovah's Witnesses and the conversion of their property to the ownership of Russia.

"Therefore the prosecutor's office considers that the transaction intended for the transfer without payment of premises on Pushkarev Street is a fiction. It was concluded only with the goal of avoiding the occurrence of adverse consequences in the form of the legal confiscation of property," the statement of the oversight agency says.

In connection with this, the prosecutor sent to the court a plaintiff's petition for finding the donation contract for real estate to be invalid and for converting it to the ownership of the RF. As of the present, the lawsuit has been granted.

It was reported earlier that the Supreme Court of Moscow on 20 April 2017, on the basis of a lawsuit of the Russian Ministry of Justice, found the Russian Jehovah's Witnesses to be an extremist organization and prohibited its activity on the territory of Russia. (tr. by PDS, posted 31 July 2018)