Tarasevich I.A., Zenkovskii A.V. The legal issues within the countermeasures against religious extremism in the context of providing religious freedom within the EAEU

Abstract: The problem of religious extremism is currently the key threat to religious freedom of any nation, and is especially relevant for the countries of the Eurasian Economic Union, at the core of which stand Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan. As a result, the constant monitoring and improvements to the normative legal base on the fight with religious extremism in these countries remains a top priority. The authors offer a brief legal comparative analysis of the legislation pertaining to the fight against religious extremism within the EAEU and formulate recommendations on the use of the leading experience of Kazakhstan and Belarus in perfecting the Russia’s legislation in the area of fighting the religious extremism. Among the conclusions, the authors emphasize the need for a balanced system of law enforcement branches in order to wage an effective fight against the religious extremism. They note that there is currently a comparable system of the branches of law enforcement agencies within the EAEU that are responsible for the cooperation between religion and the government, which significantly simplifies the processes of the legislation unification in this sphere. The authors focus their attention on the fact that such branches should not possess authoritative powers, but should rather provide intermediary and consulting services to the branches of government authority and religious organizations.

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