Source:  www.assistnews.net

Date:  2007-11-22

By Dan Wooding
Founder of ASSIST Ministries

OSIPOVICHI, BELARUS (ANS) -- Gennadi Ryzhkov, pastor of a Council of Churches Baptist congregation in Osipovichi in the eastern Mogilev Region of Belarus, has failed in his appeal to have a fine for leading unregistered worship overturned, a court official has confirmed to Forum 18 News Service.

He is now due to pay the fine of nearly one month's average wages for leading his church's harvest festival.

According to Geraldine Fagan of the Forum 18 News Service (www.forum18.org), Mikhail Sotnichenko, in whose yard the September service took place, said that the church does not agree with the state's action. "We are still holding services, of course," he said.

Fagan went onto say that the local Ideology Department head defended her actions. "Under the law a church must register, but they refuse registration," Anna Zemlyanukhina told Forum 18. "I don't agree that it's persecution. Let them meet - but they must register first."

Note: Forum 18, which is based in Oslo, Norway, notes that while the number of such fines in Belarus has fallen in recent years the level of fines is often much higher. Meanwhile, the nationwide petition to change the restrictive 2002 Religion Law has gathered nearly 40,000 signatures, its spokesperson Sergei Lukanin told Forum 18.