In Kuban, a 72-year-old Jehovah’s Witness woman has been given a two-year suspended sentence.

On 11 June, the Vyselkovsky District Court in Krasnodar Krai sentenced 72-year-old Jehovah’s Witness Lyudmila Zinina to a two-year suspended sentence with six months’ restricted freedom on charges of participating in an extremist organisation (Part 2, Article 282.2 of the Criminal Code), reports the portal “Jehovah’s Witnesses. Legal situation in Russia.”

Before the verdict was handed down, she had been under a travel ban. The hearings were held in a neighbouring settlement—Zinina relied on friends to help her travel there. She said it would have been impossible to attend court without their support due to health problems: heart and vascular diseases, osteoporosis and diabetes. She was also recently diagnosed with cancer, but treatment has not yet been started.

The case against Zinina was opened in February 2022 after mass searches of believers in Kuban, a region in southern Russia. In total, 15 people are named in the case, including Zinina’s daughter Irina—all of them are currently under travel bans or other restrictive measures, and so far, only Lyudmila has been sentenced.