Russia has banned Jehovah's Witnesses as an extremist organisation, placing the pacifist sect in the company of neo-Nazi and jihadi groups.

The justice ministry added the Jehovah's Witnesses administrative centre in Russia and 395 local branches to its register of banned organisations on Thursday.

Criminal charges can now be brought against believers for activities such as proselytizing or simply gathering together.

The move was based on an April supreme court decision that declared Jehovah's Witnesses an extremist organisation and ordered its property to be turned over to the state.

The justice ministry had testified that the millenarian group violated Russia's vague law against extremism, noting that its “religious literature forbids blood transfusions to ill members of the organisation”.

“What's going on now reminds me of Soviet times. Now as then many of our fellow believers are gathering in flats because they were shutting down our kingdom halls, many of which will now be confiscated,” said Yaroslav Sivulsky, a spokesman for Jehovah's Witnesses in Russia, adding that the group owned hundreds of buildings in Russia.

The 175,000 Jehovah's Witnesses in Russia typically refuse to vote and demand alternatives to mandatory military service.

Local authorities in several cities have already banned Jehovah's Witnesses and prosecuted believers.