A Baptist in Uzbekistan has been punished for the second time within a year for having religious books at home, according to Forum 18, an international news service based in Norway that monitors religious freedom violations.
Stanislav Kim, a Baptist from Urgench in the northwestern Khorezm Region, was sentenced Aug. 26 to two years of corrective labor for having “illegal” Christian literature in his home.
His crime, defined as “the illegal production, storage, or import into the territory of Uzbekistan with the purpose to distribute or distribution of religious materials, committed after enforcement of an administrative penalty for a similar violation,” carries fines of 100 to 200 times the minimum monthly wage or corrective labor for up to three years.
Terms of Kim’s sentence allow him to live at home under restrictions, with one fifth of his wages being seized by the state.
Kim belongs to a congregation affiliated with the Baptist Council of Churches, a group that refuses to seek registration from the state as a matter of principle. They claim Kazakhstan’s constitution affords them freedom of religion, so they should not have to get permission from the state to gather for worship.
Kim, who was previously fined 10 times the minimum monthly wage in August 2015 for the same offense, filed an appeal to Khorezm Regional Criminal Court the day the verdict was announced.
“I know that under the Religion Law you must get permission from the authorities for each separate religious book,” Kim commented to Forum 18, “but two years of paying fines to the state is too harsh punishment simply for keeping my Christian books at home.”