c. 1999 Religion News Service

MOSCOW _ Carrying automatic weapons and wearing bulletproof vests, Russian law enforcement officers have raided three Scientology facilities here over two days as part of an investigation of suspected tax evasion by the group.

The police actions were part of an 11-month investigation into the activities of the Church of Scientology in Russia, where the group founded by the late science fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard claims 3,000 active members.”There was no reason they had to do this, had to keep us out of our offices, searching for material that doesn’t exist,”Hubbard Humanitarian Center spokesman Alexei Danchenkov said angrily Friday (Feb. 26) after returning to his office following the two-day search.

Russian television reports showed tightlipped officers from the Tax Police and the Federal Security Service _ which inherited most of the former KGB’s duties _ hauling boxes of paperwork from the one-time kindergarten where the Hubbard Humanitarian Center is located.

In the United States, the Rev. Heber Jentzsch, Scientology’s international president, said in a letter of protest sent to the Russian embassy in Washington that the officials in Moscow had looked”for files, financial records, computer disks and, most offensively, confidential counseling information of parishioners protected by priest-penitent privilege.” Friday morning, about 250 members of Scientology organizations were turned out of their Moscow dormitory in a separate raid, according to Berta Heldt, a spokeswoman for the group, who said the living quarters were searched for most of the day.

A third raid was conducted on the Scientology-related Moscow Dianetics Center.

Religious freedom advocates decried the actions. Valera Nikolsky, executive director of the Moscow-based Organization for the Support of Freedom of Conscience in Society, said the raids were part of a pattern of harassment of religious minorities in Russia that has occurred since passage of a 1997 law restricting their legal rights in favor of traditional faiths such as Islam, Judaism and, in particular, Russian Orthodoxy.

The Church of Scientology has yet to seek registration as a religious organization in Russia under the 1997 law, Jentzsch said.

Danchenkov said he had no doubt the raids were intended to strengthen the Russian Orthodox Church, which suffered large-scale defections under communism and, more recently, to groups such as Scientology that have grown in Russia since the fall of the Soviet Union.”It is obvious the pressure is coming from the Russian Orthodox Church,”said Danchenkov, referring to the country’s dominant 80-million member faith headed by Patriarch Alexii II.”It was just the patriarch’s birthday and this was a wonderful present to give him _ to close us down.” The Rev. Vsevolovod Chaplin, a Russian Orthodox Church spokesman, rejected the allegation.”I don’t think His Holiness asked for that kind of birthday present,”Chaplin said.

Chaplin also said his church’s ruling Holy Synod had declared in 1994 that it is impossible to be both an Orthodox believer and a Scientologist. He said most Orthodox believers have a”negative attitude towards Scientologists and their work”but cautioned,”I don’t think there was any kind of pressure from the leadership of the church on the Tax Police to take this action.” Scientology’s problems in Russia mirror similar problems the controversial group _ which is recognized as a religion in the United States by the Internal Revenue Service _ has experienced elsewhere in Europe in recent years.

German officials have been particularly harsh in their condemnation of Scientology, saying it is more a money-making endeavor than a true religion _ a charge rejected by Scientologists.

Jentzsch said German officials”have tried to influence Russian officials to take repressive measures against Scientology.”Jentzsch urged the Russian government”to prevent further harassment of a peaceful religion.” DEA END BROWN