Two More Sentenced As Hundreds Of Jehovah’s Witnesses Face Persecution, Church Says

Two Jehovah’s Witnesses joined more than 100 fellow worshippers in a Russian prison Monday following an alleged epidemic of espionage, torture and raids against the faith, the church told the Daily Caller.

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Sergey Barsukov, 63, and Alik Yeliseyev, 35, were sentenced to six years in prison for “organizing the activities of an extremist organization” based in part on the testimony of a secret witness given the code name Panchenko, according to a statement from the Jehovah’s Witnesses. The reported sentencing comes as human rights organizations have accused Russia of targeting Jehovah’s Witnesses across the territories it controls. (RELATED: Co-Founder At Center Of Pentagon Feud Helps Shape Vatican AI Guidance)

Barsukov’s and Yeliseyev’s homes were separately raided in early 2025 before their trials began in January 2026, according to the church’s statement. Both men denied the charges against them, allegedly saying they maintained a personal right to worship even after the Russian Supreme Court liquidated local Jehovah’s Witnesses organizations in 2017.

A spokesperson for the church, Jarrod Lopes, told the Caller that Sergey had been taking care of his wife and elderly mother, while Alik had also been taking care of his wife and 10-year-old son before they were “unjustly and unconscionably separated from their families.”

“If a local Orthodox religious organization is suddenly liquidated, it wouldn’t mean that individual Orthodox believers are obliged to stop celebrating holidays such as Christmas or Easter,” Alik told the court amid a March hearing, according to the statement. “Likewise, Jehovah’s Witnesses were not obliged to renounce their personal faith after 2017, and I’m not required to stop reading and discussing the Bible.”

(Courtesy of Jehovah’s Witnesses)

The Russian government assured the U.N. Human Rights Committee that the Supreme Court’s 2017 decision did “not restrict citizens’ right to freedom of religion, and that members of the liquidated organization are free to practice their beliefs independently, provided they do not distribute extremist literature or otherwise engage in illegal activity,” according to a translation of a 2018 statement from the Russian Presidential Council for the Development of Civil Society and Human Rights.

“Thus, the Russian government consistently declares the need to respect the constitutional rights of individuals who profess the Jehovah’s Witnesses faith,” the statement continued.

The Plenum of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation ruled later in 2021 that services and ceremonies within the church are not a crime under the law even though the organization had been liquidated, according to the Jehovah’s Witnesses Russia website. The Plenum is all the justices of the country’s Supreme Court.

Despite this, Barsukov and Yeliseyev joined more than 180 Jehovah’s Witnesses currently behind bars, with more than 530 men and women having spent some time imprisoned, the church’s statement alleged.

The church also told the Caller that 2,350 residences of Witnesses have faced raids, more than 950 people have been charged criminally and nearly 600 have been placed on a federal list labeling them extremists and terrorists since the crackdown started in 2017.

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Members of the media and supporters of Dennis Christensen gather outside a courthouse after the verdict announcement in his trial in the town of Oryol on February 6, 2019. (Photo credit MLADEN ANTONOV/AFP via Getty Images)

Russian authorities have allegedly used undercover agents like Panchenko, the church told the Caller in a February statement. Such agents allegedly pose as visitors interested in the religion before infiltrating services, often for years, and recording worship through scripture study, prayer and song before claiming they witnessed “extremist” activities, according to the statement.

Over the last eight years, more than 70 victims have faced torture or violence, with eight of those cases taking place in 2025, the church told the Caller. That same year, at least 12 convicted adherents had their Russian citizenship annulled before undergoing deportation and separation from family, according to the church.

“Jehovah’s Witnesses would be grateful for the opportunity to meet with Russian authorities and resolve the misconceptions that have led to hundreds of Witness men and women being jailed simply for the peaceful practice of their Christian faith,” Lopes said.

In 2022, the European Court of Human Rights declared Russia’s ban on the church unlawful and condemned multiple cases against the church. The United Nations’ panel of the Human Rights Committee and Working Group on Arbitrary Detention has also Russia’s alleged targeting of the faith multiple times.

“On 20 April 2017, the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation granted the application of the Ministry of Justice and ruled to liquidate the National Administrative Centre of Jehovah’s Witnesses along with 395 local religious organizations of Jehovah’s Witnesses,” one opinion read in part. “The source reports that this liquidation decision is the culmination of a decades-long State attack on Jehovah’s Witnesses.”

The Caller visited Ukraine in 2025 to speak with the heads of the nation’s religions regarding the alleged persecution of Christians and other religious minorities within the Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine. (RELATED: New Bill Brings Light To All But One Church Under Russian Persecution)

Many of the consistently shared accusations include the murder and disappearance of clergy, the destruction of religious buildings, the unregistration of any non-Moscow-based religions, the co-opting of churches to teach pro-Russian propaganda and the kidnapping of Ukrainian children to be raised by Russian families within the Kremlin.

The Slavgorod City Court of the Altai Territory did not respond to the Daily Caller’s request for comment.

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