Date: Tue, 3 Jul 2001
From: Allison Henry < Allison.Henry@RRT.GOV.AU >
To: Dukh-i-zhizniki Molokans

Update 2024:

From:
Allison Henry
Country Research
Refugee Review Tribunal
Locked Bag No A3
Sydney South NSW 1235
Ph: (612) 9951 5919
Fax: (612) 9951 5889
Email: Allison.Henry@rrt.gov.au

 

Before 1993, 7 refugee petitions for Dukh-i-zhizniki from Armenia in Australia were submitted to the Refugee Status Review Committee (RSRC), which ended on 11 June 1993, and the cases were tansferred to the Refugee Review Tribunal (RRT) that sent this email. In 2015, the RRT became a division of the division of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) (1976-2022), which became the Administrative Review Tribunal (ART) in 2024.

 

Subject: Information request
Our Ref: GGA14715
Date: 3 July 2001

Dear Sir or Madam,

My name is Allison Henry and I am a researcher for the Australian Refugee Review Tribunal in Sydney. The Refugee Review Tribunal is an independent Tribunal set up by legislation to undertake merit review of applications for refugee status of persons in Australia. Our website URL at <http://www.rrt.gov.au>[See: Internet Archive] contains more information about the Tribunal. One of the functions of the Country Research Unit is to obtain information to support the review function of the Tribunal.

I am currently researching the treatment of Dukh-i-zhizniki Molokans in Russia and Georgia and have found your website most useful. I was hoping that you may be able to assist with two questions:

I hope you are able to help with these questions, as I have been unable to find evidence of any such incidents. Alternatively, could you please tell me if there is someone else who could help and give me their contact details (email, fax or telephone)?

If you have any questions about this request, please do not hesitate to contact me, either by email or on the telephone or fax numbers given above.

Please be aware that any information you provide may form part of the information used by the Tribunal to review applications for refugee status. Through use of the information, your identity and that of your organisation may be disclosed to applicants, their advisers, the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs (2001-2006), or otherwise become publicly available.

Thank you very much for your time and I hope you are able to provide some assistance.

Yours sincerely,

Allison Henry
Senior Country Researcher

Subject: Re: Information request
Date: Tue, 03 Jul 2001
From: Andrei Conovaloff
To: Allison Henry <Allison.Henry@RRT.GOV.AU>

Allison Henry wrote:

> Are you aware of any incidents where Dukh-i-zhizniki Molokans have experienced adverse treatment in Georgia?

In 2001, there were about 5 congregations of Molokane in Gerogia. Only Dukh-i-zhizniki were wanted in Australia.

Probably no more than any other Russians in Georgia. I don't know that Molokans were singled out and abused.

In 2015 I visited 2 congregations of Molokane in Tbilisi, Georgia. Elder women reported frequent harrasment on the street for being "Russian". I saw vandalism and theft of their prayer-meeting hall furniture and kitchen items.

In 1992, I heard first hand from a Dukh-i-zhiznik Molokan refugee from Armenia that the Armenian youth would often tell the old Russians Molokans who were in a bread line: "Old man, your bread is in Russia!" On the other hand, there are journalists like Grigorian who treasure the Dukh-i-zhizniki and Molokans in Armenia.

My wife is a Molokan from Russia. She is from the Mineral Water's area of south Stavropol'skii krai. While we were dating in the summer of 1992, her neighbor saw on the TV news and reported to me that day about Molokan villages in the Arzerbaidjan-Karabakh being shelled, home damaged. Several Molokans interviews were shown about their fear and talk of having to abandon their homes and flee to Russia.

In 1996 in Los Angeles County, I collected a first hand report from a Georgian woman, name in my notes someplace, who was applying for refugee status. In Tbilisi, she owned the upper floor of the Molokan Center and school (3 Nikolai Gogol street) a few blocks from the main train depot in the old Molokan Quarter district. The school was in operation in the early 1900s. Several Molokan publications are cited from that organization in 1905 and 1912, including the current dogma for the Union of Spiritual Christians Constant Molokans. I suspect the building was confiscated during Stalin's time and converted to three apartments. The first floor apartment in 1996 was occupied by an old Molokan woman. The Georgian woman reported that within the first months that she was here in the US, her vacant apartment had been searched with walls and tiles ripped by soldiers looking for hidden money. She telephoned her downstairs neighbor, and was very concerned for the old woman's safety.

In 1997, I met a Russian Academy of Science anthropologist, Swetlana Inikova, who had just returned from visiting Molokane and Dukhoborsty in Georgia. She said she could not imagine how anyone would survive the poverty she saw.

> Are you aware of any incidents where Dukh-i-zhizniki Molokans have experienced adverse treatment in Russia?

Again, not any more than other Russian refugees fleeing from the new republics.

Allison, I'll post your note and my reply to Molokan NEWS* and maybe someone will add more.

More than 25 Dukh-i-zhizniki Molokans have immigrated in the past 10 years to California from Armenia and an equal number to Australia. I am in Arizona, but Molokan NEWS readers in California may ask them and report back to you.

Most of the these immigrants arrived in the past 5 years to the Los Angeles area. The sponsors are American Dukh-i-zhizniki Jumpers who are reaching out only to help the Armenia Dukh-i-zhizniki Jumpers (who they call nashi: "our people"), hoping to import fresh Russian speakers and as humanitarian aid for distant relatives. The Australian Dukh-i-zhizniki Molokans, nearly all Jumpers with whom you are probably in contact, have imported Dukh-i-zhizniki Molokan Jumpers also from Armenia for the same reasons. I know first hand from someone working in your Autralian immigration service that visas where approved for 40 Dukh-i-zhizniki span style="text-decoration: line-through;">Molokans from Armenia, but that quota was never filled by the Australian Dukh-i-zhizniki Molokan hosts--probably due to costs and inter-congregational distputes finances.

Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2001
From: Allison Henry < Allison.Henry@RRT.GOV.AU >
To: 'Andrei Conovaloff'
Dear Andrew,

Thank you very much for your prompt and informative reply, your assistance is very much appreciated.

Regards,
Allison Henry

Subject: Re: Information request
Date: Thur, 05 Jul 2001
From: Andrei Conovaloff
To: Allison Henry <Allison.Henry@RRT.GOV.AU>

I got an e-mail from a friend whose family is in Australia and is trying to invite Russian relatives. They already may be working with your office. She said that she's forwarding your request to several Australian Dukh-i-zhizniki Molokans.

Andrei

 

Postscript 2024:

In Australia, after about 10 families of Dukh-i-zhizniki arrived from Armenia, the hosts realized, by about 2010, that their Americanized Dukh-i-zhiznik faiths were not compatible with the faiths of immigrants from Armenian (they called Yerevansky). They evolved differently, seperated for a century in different cultures. They had different holidays, Russian dialects, and songs and melodies. The Yerevansky in South Australia were allowed to form their own Dukh-i-zhiznik congregation which meets seperately from the other Dukh-i-zhiznik faiths from America in Australia. Members of these different Dukh-i-zhiznik congregations can intermarry and are often cross-invited for funerals, weddings and child chistenings.

 

News 2001.

Spiritual Christians of Russia Around the World.