Did a Russian JW try to bribe to get JWs accepted as religious community?

by Dogpatch 7 Replies latest jw friends

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  Dogpatch

  I wonder if this is going on in other European or Eastern-block countries where JWs are not liked too well. This document states that a JW was imprisoned for trying to bribe officials into accepting his congregation into the religious community. The quote is number 48 in the long list after the introduction at:

  http://www.hri.ca/fortherecord2000/documentation/commission/e-cn4-2000-9.htm

  48.Aleksandr Viktorovich Usenko, a Jehovah's Witness, was reportedly arrested by three officials from the Baku City Procurator's Office on 13 November 1997 after allegedly offering a bribe in exchange for the registration of his congregation as a religious community. He was reportedly taken to Investigation Isolation Prison No. 1, Bailov Prison, where he was allegedly beaten and verbally abused by an investigator. He was subsequently sentenced to three years' probation after being convicted of bribery. He reportedly lodged a complaint about his treatment with the Baku City Procurator.

  Who knows exactly who to beleive in this case, but if similar arrests in otehr countries are occurring, it would be an interesting pattern!

  Randy Watters

  Net Soup!

  http://www.freeminds.org/
• 

  garybuss

  
  
  We could offer a bribe to the officials to get them to reveal if they accepted a bribe from the Watch Tower Publishing Corporation. If nothing else we would have proof that the officials do accept bribes.
  
  Btw, why would they not like someone who is willing to give them money?
  
  
• 

  ozziepost

  I wonder where he got the money from to make the bribe?

  Just a thought.

  Cheers, Ozzie
• 

  cruzanheart

  "As always, should you be captured we will disavow all knowledge of your activities."

  Mission Impossible -- The Next Generation
• 

  garybuss

  
  
  Hey! Maybe they are filming a new TV show . . . Witness Impossible! Their goal would be to piss everybody off and then ask them for favors. When the favors are refused, they offer cash bribes and their mission, if the choose to accept it, is to get arrested without the arrest making the papers or the Internet.
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  Gamaliel

  As I understand it, the bribes that JWs were supposed to offer in Mexico, were to keep the Society labelled as a NON-religoius organization. If the young Mexican borthers were to claim that it was their religion that made them refuse the military service, then an investigation would have happened and the government would quickly learn that the JWs were really a religion after all. Then the Romans [Catholics] would take away their "temple" and their land.

  I think this is an excellent find, btw, Randy. I'd bet money it was an arranged bribe that went wrong.

  Gamaliel
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  izobcenec

  Before judging, you should also read line 49 in that report:

  49.Nazilya Veliyeva, Arif Babayev and Rovshah Nariman ogly Mursalov, members of the same congregation of Jehovah's Witnesses, were reportedly called for interrogation and beaten around 16 November 1997. Rovshan Mursalov was allegedly beaten for refusing to sign a statement prepared by the police, and sought medical treatment for a burst eardrum sustained during the beatings. Eleven Jehovah's Witnesses have reportedly lodged complaints of ill-treatment with the Office of the Prosecutor.
  
  I personaly think it all about the bribe was made up...
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  Nikita

  It is not uncommon for people in general (in those eastern-block nations) to offer "bribes" to the officals and local police-that was my observation while in Moldova. More often than not the "official" requests the bribe in order to expedite things and the general population has a choice to go along with it or face the "consequences."

  I would agree with Gamaliel -it was probably arranged and went wrong.

  Nikita