JW's Banned In Tajikistan...

by brinjen 21 Replies latest jw friends

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  brinjen

  Tajikistan bans Jehovah's Witnesses

  Posted Tue Oct 23, 2007 8:22am AEST

  Ex-Soviet Tajikistan outlawed the Jehovah's Witnesses religious organisation on Monday, saying its missionary activities violated the laws of the predominantly Muslim Central Asian state.

  "Door-to-door missionary activities, calls to refuse to serve in the armed forces and their intolerance of other religions contradict the law," Tajik Culture Minister Mirzoshohruh Asrorov told a news conference.

  Jehovah's Witnesses in Tajikistan could not immediately be reached for comment.

  According to official figures, more than 95 percent of the Tajik population belong to the Sunni branch of Islam and another two percent are Shiites. The Tajik government though is strictly secular.

  The Jehovah's Witnesses have around 5 million members worldwide but number only in the hundreds in Tajikistan, most of whom joined in the early 1990s.

  Human rights activists say members of the group face persecution Central Asia.

  In July, Amnesty International urged nearby Turkmenistan to revoke suspended sentences handed down to three Jehovah's Witnesses accused of refusing to serve in the army on religious grounds.

  -Reuters

  http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/10/23/2066984.htm
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  Jourles

  "Door-to-door missionary activities, calls to refuse to serve in the armed forces and their intolerance of other religions contradict the law,"

  I guess they better move elsewhere if they feel that the above beliefs are their God given right.
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  Dansk

  This caught my eye:

  The Jehovah's Witnesses have around 5 million members

  It was always six million when I was in.

  Ian
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  James Free

  I wish governments would NOT ban the JW's. They always seem to thrive when under 'persecution'.
• 

  brinjen

  The Jehovah's Witnesses have around 5 million members

  It was always six million when I was in.

  I noticed that too... Does that mean their numbers are declining or are those figures just wrong?
• 

  Dansk

  Does that mean their numbers are declining

  Jolly well hope so

  Trouble is, we only really have the org's numbers to go by, so it's hard to say. However, judging by the number of newbies coming here all the time and the bad press Watchtower is continually getting it is most likely that they are definitely down.

  Ian
• 

  WTWizard

  There is a better way. Rather than banning the Witlesses which just forces them underground, they should educate the public. Having public service announcements about the tricks the Watchtower Society uses to defraud and scam would bring their recruitment rates down to zero. And they need to be denied charity status and tax exempt status so they can waste more money paying taxes.

  If education doesn't work, then perhaps embarrassment will. They could publish the news about the pedophiles and the Two-Witness (tm) rule in the mainstream journals and newspapers. Also, publishing discrepencies found in their accounting will make people think twice before joining. That should keep their numbers down, no matter how much time they waste going from door to door.

  A final trump card would be to crack down hard on child abuse, especially on the emotional kind found so universally among Witlesses. Beyond what the Establishment says, anyone that requires toddlers to be spending their whole days out in field circus or that regularly has children staying up past 10 PM on school nights is looking at blatant child abuse. And, if every child that has suffered more than one beating (a beating is where the child is put at risk of physical injury or suffers serious physical injury) on more than one occasion stemming from a meeting were pulled from that religion, the numbers would drop quite sharply.

  Perhaps if the public was educated and the Tower embarrassed enough, then the numbers would start going south in a hurry.
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  James Free

  There is a better way. Rather than banning the Witlesses which just forces them underground, they should educate the public. Having public service announcements about the tricks the Watchtower Society uses to defraud and scam would bring their recruitment rates down to zero. And they need to be denied charity status and tax exempt status so they can waste more money paying taxes.

  I agree. Banning them has never stopped the JW's. But, exposing them is much better. Also, deny access to missionaries and ban the literature. It will at least stop it from being offered in public.
• 

  SirNose586

  Tajikstan, you fools! That'll just make more of them pop up.

  I so wish they'd just register on the forum first if they wanted some tips.
• 

  Honesty

  The JW's will just pull their TRUMP card out of their bag of trix and the Tajikistan government will wish they had educated instead of banned:

  But before all these things, they will lay their hands on you and persecute you. They will hand you over to the synagogue s and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors because of My name.

  Luke 21:12

  They rarely use Jesus' name except when it is necessary to recruit more followers for the Watchtower Society.