Moscow, Russia -- A Buddhist monk has filed a lawsuit against Roskomnadzor, the state media watchdog, after it banned a religious text from the 5th century, the Interfax news agency reported Friday.
Pannuyavudho Topper Bkhikkhu, who is also an administrator of the theravada.ru website, received in September a warning from Rozkomnadzor saying that one of the texts from his site contained information banned for distribution in Russia, his lawyer Vitaliy Cherkasov said, Interfax reported.
The monk then had to remove the text from theravada.ru, which serves a St.
Petersburg-based buddhist community, as the site could have been blocked by the
watchdog, Cherkasov said.
The warning was issued because the 5th-century text Godhika Sutta Godhika
allegedly contained the description of a certain way to commit suicide,
Cherkasov told the agency.
“My client had to delete the comment, which has existed for 16 centuries, but
all of the sudden Roskomnadzor in the 21st [century] showed up,” Cherkasov
said.
A controversial Russian law enacted in 2012 prohibits online content advocating
suicide and drug use, among other things. Any website in violation can be
blocked by the government and be included in the country's official registry of
forbidden sites.