Russia

12 profiled groups with documented operations in Russia — 3 Extreme-band, 5 High-band, 4 Moderate or below. Presence here describes documented operations, not a judgement about Russia or its communities; many listed groups also operate elsewhere.

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Christian

Skoptsy (historical Russian self-castration sect)

Russian sect (1772+) that broke from the Khlysty over the requirement of literal self-castration ('the seal of fire', 'the small seal' / 'the great seal'). Founder Kondratii Selivanov claimed to be the resurrected Tsar Peter III and the second Christ. Criminalised throughout the Tsarist period; effectively extinct by mid-20th c.

Christian

Khlysty (Khristovshchina, historical Russian flagellants)

Russian underground sect (17th c.–early 20th c.) believing the Holy Spirit re-incarnated in successive 'living Christs' and 'living Mothers of God'. Distinctive ecstatic spinning rite (radenie) and ascetic celibacy paired with sexual antinomian variants.

New Religious Movement

Vissarion (Church of the Last Testament, Siberia)

Russian living-Christ sect founded in 1991 by ex-traffic-cop Sergei Torop ('Vissarion'). ~5,000 followers built remote 'Sun City' (Petropavlovka, Krasnoyarsk Krai) settlements in Siberia. Vissarion and two top lieutenants arrested by Russian FSB in September 2020; criminal trial ongoing as of 2024.

New Religious Movement

Post-Soviet Russian and Eastern European NRMs (umbrella)

Umbrella entry covering a documented pattern of high-control new religious movements that emerged in the post-Soviet space following the 1991 collapse of the USSR — concentrated in Russia, Ukraine, and adjacent former Soviet states, and documented in Russian and international academic work on post-Soviet religious revival, in sustained Russian and Ukrainian press, and in multiple national regulatory and criminal proceedings against named figures. Several specific named movements within this pattern are profiled separately in the catalogue. This umbrella covers the pattern at the genre level; it does NOT generalise to the broader diversity of post-Soviet religious revival.

Political / Ideological

Wagner Group / Africa Corps (Russian PMC, post-2023)

Russian private military company founded by Yevgeny Prigozhin (2014). Documented mass civilian casualties. Prigozhin killed in 2023 plane crash following his June 2023 mutiny; rebranded as Africa Corps under Russian state control.

Political / Ideological

Russian Imperial Movement

Russian white-supremacist paramilitary organisation. Designated Specially Designated Global Terrorist by the US State Department in 2020. Trains foreign neo-Nazis at Partizan camp.

Political / Ideological

Russian 'Sovereign Citizens' / Grazhdane SSSR (Citizens of the USSR)

Russian pseudo-legal sovereign-citizen-style movement (Grazhdane SSSR — 'Citizens of the USSR') asserting that the Soviet Union was never legally dissolved, that all post-1991 Russian institutions are illegitimate, and that adherents can refuse taxes, debts and Russian citizenship via 'declaration of Soviet citizenship'. The Russian Supreme Court designated the movement extremist in 2024.

Political / Ideological

National Bolshevik Party / Other Russia (Limonov)

National Bolshevik Party (NBP, Russian Натионал-большевистская партия) was a Russian political-ideological organisation founded May 1993 (formally registered 1994) by writer Eduard Limonov (Eduard Veniaminovich Savenko, 1943–2020) and political philosopher Alexander Dugin (b. 1962). Distinctive 'national Bolshevik' synthesis fused far-left economic Marxism-Leninism with far-right Russian-nationalist ethnocentrism, using the visual aesthetic of a hammer-and-sickle inside a black-and-red flag deliberately echoing both Soviet and Nazi imagery. Banned by Russia as extremist in 2007. Limonov continued political activity through The Other Russia coalition until his 2020 death; successor groups (E.V. Limonov People's Party, Other Russia of E.V. Limonov) continue at reduced scale. The Dugin-NBP relationship ended in 1998 over doctrinal disputes; Dugin's subsequent Eurasianism became the more academically prominent legacy and is covered separately.

Christian

Russian Old Believers — Bezpopovtsy (priestless)

Priestless wing of the Russian Old Believer schism that rejected the 1652–66 Nikonian liturgical reforms. Concentrated in remote Russia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania (Lipovans), Alaska, and Oregon. Subsumes the Pomortsy, Fedoseyans, Filippovtsy and others.

Christian

Russian Old Believers (Starovery)

Russian Orthodox Christians who rejected the 1666 Nikonian liturgical reforms. Several million globally, primarily in Russia and diaspora. Mostly low-control with strong tradition of distinctive practice.

Christian

Russian Orthodox Church — Moscow Patriarchate

Mainstream Eastern Orthodox church; largest single Orthodox church globally. Substantial post-2022 entanglement with Russian state support for invasion of Ukraine.

Christian

Eastern Orthodox Christianity

The communion of autocephalous Eastern Christian churches (Greek, Russian, Serbian, Romanian, etc.) is a low-CLCI mainstream tradition with rich liturgical life and broad lay autonomy outside the liturgy.

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Complete list of 12 group profiles