MOSCOW, July 29 (RAPSI) – The Eighth Cassation Court of General Jurisdiction on Thursday dismissed an appeal lodged by the representatives of a cell of Falun Dafa movement (Chinese religious doctrine Falun Gong) in Russia’s Republic of Khakassia against prohibition of the organization’s activity as extremist, the court’s press service told RAPSI.

In November 2020, the Fifth Appeals Court of General Jurisdiction granted a prosecutor’s motion to ban the cell of Falun Dafa. The court thus overturned the republican Supreme Court’s refusal to prohibit the organization as extremist.

According to the appeals instance, the organization has operated since 2006 using and distributing literature labeled as extremist.

In July, seven foreign organizations supporting the followers of Chinese religious doctrine Falun Gong or Falun Dafa were declared undesirable in the Russian Federation.

Falun Gong or Falun Dafa is a religious movement founded by its leader Li Hongzhi in China in the early 1990s. After the movement had been banned several its leaders received long prison terms for organizing illegal mass events, infliction of harm to life and health of the doctrine’s followers and espionage. Certain Falun Dafa information materials have been declared extremist in Russia.