A post is being shared widely on social media with a claim that Russian President Putin has announced Islam as the second State religion of Russia. Let’s fact-check the claim made in the post.
Claim: President Putin has announced Islam as the second State religion of Russia.
Fact: No such announcement has been made by Russian President Putin. Russia is a secular State with no State religion. Also, the posted photo is an old one. Hence the claim made in the post is FALSE.
When we searched on the internet if President Putin has announced Islam as the second State religion of Russia, no related reports were found. If he has really made such an announcement, many reputed news agencies would have reported about it. But none of the news agencies reported any such announcement by President Putin. Some of the recently reported articles by a Russian news agency on the topics – ‘Putin, Islam’ can be seen here.
In the ‘2021 Report on International Religious Freedom: Russia’, it can be read that – “the constitution stipulates the state is secular and provides for religious freedom, freedom of conscience, and freedom of religious worship, including the right to “profess, individually or jointly with others, any religion, or to profess no religion.”……It states all religious associations are equal and separate from the state. The law acknowledges Christianity, Islam, Judaism, and Buddhism as the country’s four “traditional” religions, constituting an inseparable part of the country’s historical heritage. The law recognizes the “special role” of Russian Orthodox Christianity in the country’s “history and the formation and development of its spirituality and culture”.” Similar statements can be also found in the Russian constitution.
According to the ‘2021 Report on International Religious Freedom: Russia’, “a poll conducted in 2020 by the independent Levada Center found that 63 percent of the population identified as Orthodox Christian and 7 percent as Muslim, while 26 percent reported having no religious faith…..According to Mufti Ravil Gaynutdin, chairman of the Religious Board of Muslims of the Russian Federation, there were 25 million Muslims in 2018, approximately 18 percent of the population. Immigrants and migrant workers from Central Asia, which experts estimate at six to seven million, are mostly Muslim”.
The posted photo is also an old one. The photo was taken in 2012. Some of the old articles which published the same photo can be seen here, here, and here.
To sum it up, President Putin has not announced Islam as the second State religion of Russia.
