Russia Detains Falun Gong Practitioner for 2 Months in Jail

A Moscow court on May 4 ordered the 2-month detention of a Falun Gong practitioner for her beliefs as an investigation is pending, the first such decision in the country as Russia increasingly leans toward communist China.

Natalya Minenkova, 46, will be detained until June 27 under a controversial law against “carrying out the activities of an undesirable organization,” the Tushinsky District Court of Moscow ruled. The list of “undesirable organizations” includes independent media outlets, journalism groups, and American think tanks, among others.

In the brief synopsis of the case released by Russian police, Ms. Minenkova was accused of illegally organizing the activities of The Center for Spiritual and Physical Improvement Falun Dafa. The center is not one of the organizations listed by the Russian Ministry of Justice in relation to the law.

The hearing came after police raided the homes of five practitioners of the meditation discipline, which has been facing brutal persecution in China since 1999. Ms. Minenkova was one of four people detained. One man was released. Police questioned Ms. Minenkova and two others, but held Ms. Minenkova overnight until the court appearance on May 4.

“By sentencing Ms. Minenkova to a detention center, Russia joins communist China as the only other country on Earth to imprison their own citizens simply for meditating and aspiring to live by Falun Gong’s teachings of truthfulness, compassion, and forbearance,” Levi Browde, executive director of the Falun Dafa Information Center, told The Epoch Times. “This shameful act further erodes freedoms in Russia, and demonstrates Russia’s growing, and disconcerting, ties to China’s communist regime.”

The trend is worrying Rep. Tom Tiffany (R-Wis.).

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“It’s no secret that one of the CCP’s primary exports is oppression, and that’s very concerning,” he told The Epoch Times.

In China, an estimated 70 million to 100 million people practiced Falun Gong and credited it for uplifting their mental and physical health. The Chinese regime saw such popularity as a threat and began a campaign to systematically eradicate the faith, fueling abuses such as slave labor and forced organ harvesting.

Natalya Minenkova does the Falun Gong meditation in Dendropark in Moscow, Russia, on July 5, 2022. (The Epoch Times)

The prosecutors began a criminal investigation targeting Ms. Minenkova on April 27, a week before the raid, court records obtained by The Epoch Times show. In the court record, they accused her of committing a “serious crime against the foundation of the constitutional order and security of the state,” noting that she had organized Falun Gong-related meetings and distributed Falun Gong literature.

Mr. Browde argued that such activities hardly constitute a crime.

“The sum total of what Ms. Minenkova was doing is bringing music to a park and guiding others to do meditation exercises, while hosting readings of spiritual texts in her home, all as a volunteer because she wanted to share the benefits she received from practicing Falun Dafa with others.” Mr. Browde stated. “Falun Gong is neither a ‘sect’ nor is Ms. Minenkova a ‘leader,’ illustrating the completely false portrayal of this case by Russia’s government-controlled press.”

In questioning one of the two witnesses before the trial, an investigator asked about the size of the group in the country, the main books of Falun Gong, and whether they had attended Falun Gong events abroad.

People familiar with Ms. Minenkova described her as kind, always smiling, and ready to help others. She quit drinking and smoking after taking up the practice in 2010, after seeing her mother’s poor vision improve since practicing Falun Gong.

The escalating pressure in Russia on Falun Gong comes as Moscow moves closer to China, leaning on its military support in the Ukraine war. Russia’s leader Vladimir Putin said he will be in China this month, in what marks their latest show of friendship since the two countries declared a “no limit” partnership shortly before the invasion.

The White House in Washington on Oct. 26, 2023. (Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times)

The development has brought concerns in the United States.

“We are concerned about this whether it happens in China or Russia or elsewhere in the world,” a White House National Security Council spokesperson told NTD, a sister media of The Epoch Times.

“It’s no secret that one of the CCP’s primary exports is oppression, and that’s very concerning.”

The State Department in the latest human rights report said Russia has “misused antiterrorism and anti-extremism laws, as well as other measures” in going after a regional branch of Falun Gong and seven Falun Gong-associated nonprofits “without any credible evidence of violent actions or intentions,” effectively banning the groups’ activities and subjecting believers to mistreatment.