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BBC NEWS Russia's Supreme Court has begun hearing a government request to outlaw the Jehovah's Witnesses and declare it an extremist organisation. The justice ministry has already placed its headquarters near St Petersburg on a list of extremist groups. An estimated eight million people worldwide are part of the Christian-based movement, best known for going door to door looking for new converts. It has 175,000 members in Russia and 395 branches across the country. As the case began in Moscow on Wednesday, lawyers representing the movement submitted a counter suit, asking the High Court to declare its members victims of political repression and the justice ministry's action unlawful. The court ruled that this was not part of its jurisdiction, but did not say whose it was,  Russia's legal information agency reported . The case was eventually adjourned until Thursday. The ministry argues that the Jehovah's Witnesses' activities "violate Russia's l...

U.S.: RUSSIA'S BAN OF JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES AS 'EXTREMIST' SHOWS THAT MOSCOW VIEWS ALL INDEPENDENT RELIGIONS AS A THREAT BY  JASON LE MIERE   The Russian justice ministry’s call for the country’s Jehovah’s Witnesses headquarters to be shut down represents an attempt to “eliminate the legal existence” of the religion, said the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF). The USCIRF is a bipartisan federal commission, with commissioners appointed by the president, the Senate and the House. The justice ministry suspended the Jehovah’s Witnesses headquarters in St. Petersburg last month, alleging that its activities “violate Russia’s law on combating extremism.” The Russian branch of the U.S.-based religion said a ban on its headquarters would directly affect around 400 local branches in the country and all 2277 of its religious groups, with their 175,000 followers. Russia’s Supreme Court ...

The Helsinki Commission has condemned the pending legal action to ban Jehovah’s Witnesses in Russia, and urged the government of that country to drop the case immediately. Statements from the Commission said the government of Russia is applying “flawed counterterrorism laws to those who seek to practice their faith,” and called on the government to desist from “exploiting genuine threats of violent extremism to undermine what little religious freedom remains in that country.”Signed by the Helsinki Commission Chairman Sen. Roger Wicker (MS), Co-Chairman Rep. Chris Smith (NJ-04), and Commissioner Rep. Richard Hudson (NC-08),the statements said the attack “distracts from real efforts to fight terrorism.“I urge the Russian government to drop the case immediately,” Chairman Wicker wrote.The statements, issued on March 28, 2017, by the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), which promotes human rights and economic security inE...