Edited by Alexander Verkhovsky
We publish regular analytical reports on radical nationalism and public and state counteraction to it. This report has been compiled on the basis of the SOVA center's daily monitoring of the situation and covers the events and tendencies of the Winter 2006/7 period.
Summary
Manifestations of Radical Nationalism : Violence : Vandalism : Activities of Organized Right-Wing Groups : Nationalism as Electoral Resource
Counteraction to Radical Nationalism : Criminal Prosecution of the Right-Wing Radicals
Excessive and Unfounded Actions against Extremism : Lawmaking : Judicial Enforcement : Administrative Arbitrariness
Summary
The 2006 - 2007 winter season saw most of the negative trends which we have observed over the recent years.
Firstly, there was an increase of racist and neo-Nazi violence which, unfortunately, the law enforcement agencies were unable to suppress, especially in the main centers of violence, such as Moscow and St. Petersburg. The number of victims grew by 30% as opposed to the 2005-2006 winter season. [1]
Secondly, right-wing radical organizations are increasingly active and gradually join their forces. Regardless of serious clashes between individual :Fuhrers;, the ultra-right managed to organize and coordinate public actions on a national scale. At the same time, the Russian ultra-right are now preparing for the :big elections season; and will use election campaigns to organize massive propaganda and strengthen their links with "the big ones" - particularly, the pro-presidential United Russia and Fair Russia parties.
Thirdly, the biggest political parties are apparently willing to exploit xenophobic sentiments in their election campaigns.
And finally, it has become increasingly obvious that the selective enforcement of anti-extremist legislation against organizations and individuals depends on whether they are loyal to the overall political regime and/or to the local administrations. A lack of such loyalty, rather than the actual practices of individuals and groups (regardless of whether such practices are offensive or violent) is one of the main criteria triggering the enforcement of :anti-extremist; laws. NGOs and individual civil society activist critical of the current government suffer increasing pressure and persecution under the :anti-extremism" provisions. At the same time, attempts have been made to restrict civil liberties even more by adopting new "anti-extremism" laws and policies.
Unfortunately, positive progress in counteracting radical nationalism and xenophobia in Russia (in winter, such progress was mainly due to criminal prosecution of offenders) is too small and clearly incapable of making any substantial difference under the current circumstances.
Manifestations of Radical Nationalism
Violence
In the winter of 2006-2007 we observed a continued growth of the right-wing radical violence. At least 156 people were affected, 21 of them killed. To compare, in the previous winter season at least 120 were affected, including 9 who were killed. Moscow and St. Petersburg continue to be the main centers of racist violence in Russia, while in Voronezh the rates of neo-Nazi violence apparently dropped - due at least partially, we believe, to a series of trials of skinheads held locally in recent years. In contrast, a new hotbed of tensions was reported in Nizhny Novgorod, where at least 16 were affected over the three winter months. Overall, violent racist attacks were reported in 16 Russian regions in winter, even in regions where no racist assaults had ever been reported before (e.g. Orenburg).
We need to emphasize once again that at least some skinhead-perpetrated crimes were designed to draw media attention. One example was an attack against a young antifascist in Moscow - a homemade explosive device was planted outside his apartment; five policemen were injured and a police dog was killed as it was defused. Other high-profile racist crimes committed over the past winter included the killing of three Korean workers in Vladivostok, an attack against Russian Newsweek reporter Aidar Buribayev, and an attempted murder of St. Petersburg antifascist Ivan Yelin who was stabbed more than 20 times.
Vandalism
Xenophobic vandalism is as common as before, and similarly to the racist violence, it is increasingly demonstrative and even more importantly, better organized. For example, a synagogue in Ulyanovsk was vandalized twice within three days; a synagogue in Vladivostok was covered with graffiti under FSB surveillance cameras, and in Volgograd, skinheads staged a massive graffiti attack by driving from site to site - they particularly prided themselves on painting neo-Nazi graffiti over a police post.
In many cases, though, right-wing radicals are confident of their impunity - as for example, the Eurasian Youth Union (ESM) activists who attacked the office of the Russian Family Planning Association in Orenburg and the Mormon Church office in Samara. ESM claimed responsibility for the attacks saying that they would continue their pressure against the :sectants;, because, they said :acts of vandalism are extremely important for building a sovereign democracy and a healthy civil society in Russia". It is not the first time that ESM activists claim responsibility for violent attacks, but the law enforcement agencies have never investigated the organization which is totally loyal to the current political regime and sees its mission in preventing "an orange revolution" in Russia.
Overall, in the 2006-2007 winter season, we documented at least 25 acts of vandalism (including 14 motivated by religious intolerance) in 19 regions. As before, vandals most often targeted synagogues and Jewish cultural centers (9 episodes). Clearly "ideological" motives of vandalism were often reported in cases such as desecration of WWII memorials, attacks against offices of political opponents - at least six such episodes were documented.
Activities of Organized Right-Wing Groups
Serious conflicts were observed among right-wing radicals in winter - an outsider will find it difficult to understand the underlying reasons. A major part of these conflicts were related to Alexander Potkin (Belov), leader of the Movement against Illegal Immigration (DPNI); he came under criticism for being agent-provocateur and collaborator with opinion engineers in the Kremlin, and for telling lies to discredit the right-wing radicals. Indeed, Belov's actions give grounds for such attacks - nevertheless, the conflict has not yet made a visible difference for the activity of DPNI and its allies.
The most successful action in winter organized by the Russian ultra-right was a meeting :in support of political prisoners; on 28 January - by political prisoners, the organizers meant those facing charges or convicted for hate crimes (campaigning as well as violence).
Meetings were held in more than a dozen Russian cities, and while their attendance was less than that of the Russian March held a few months before (in Moscow, around 300 people took part in the March). Some obvious reasons behind the success of right-wing radicals include their human rights slogans, being open about potential participants as well as the individuals they advocated for (each region nominated their own "political prisoner candidates; - for example, in Kurgan these included Vitaly Sulima - a local national-patriot convicted and sentenced for an :ordinary; murder). However, the above reasons fail to explain why DPNI with allies, in spite of official counteraction, managed to organize two nation-wide actions within three months, having agreed common slogans and schedules of their protests. The highest rate of coordination observed in anti-migrant actions before had been associated with an event organized in March 2004 only in three Russian cities.
Winter was also a period of active and visible organizing. Suffice it to say that at least five right-wing party congresses were held in the three winter months, including the Russian All-National Union (RONS) on 10 December, the :Rus; Party in Defense of the Russian Constitution [2] on 14 December, the National Imperial Party of Russia (NDPR) on 24 February, and the Military Officers' Union on 17 February.
The most notable organizing event was the :restorative; assembly of the Congress of Russian Communities (KRO), which, in addition to KRO leader Dmitry Rogozin, featured such guests as Andrei Savelyev, Alexander Belov, Vladimir Kralin (Thor) and other odious personalities. In addition to traditional appeals to :defend the Russian people;, the participants voiced the 14 Words by David Lane - a neo-Nazi credo.
Nationalism as Electoral Resource
Understandably, intensive organizing has something to do with the era of election campaigns which Russia is now entering and where right-wing radicals see themselves as active participants. It is difficult to say whether their calculation is correct, partially because due to over-regulation of elections there is no way of finding out the real electoral preferences of most Russians. Moreover, the chances of newcomers other than those endorsed by the Kremlin are the lowest. But in this particular case participation is more important than victory: right-wing radicals view election campaigning as a legal opportunity to promote ethno-nationalist ideas with public money, and to access an audience they usually cannot reach. For example, during a local election campaign in Lubertsy outside Moscow[3] right-wing radicals staged pickets, engaged in door to door canvassing, etc. Incidentally, in Lubertsy, once again, they made references to the 2005 Rodina Party election scandal (involving a racist promotional video Let Us Clean Our City of Trash). In Lubertsy, campaign leaflets of a RONS candidate (supported by DPNI) featured a slogan in bold "For Faith, Freedom, and Better Life! Let Us Clean the City of Trash!; followed by inconspicuous, small print with critical remarks about municipal cleaning services.
Speaking about the uncertainty of nationalist electoral potential, we can also mention that in Bodaibo, Irkutsk Oblast, the winner in the local elections was Yevgeny Yumashev, and the only thing which is known about him is that he was an ex-member of LDPR. Associates of MP Kuryanovich - and the MP himself - describe Yumashev as a member of Kuryanovich Crew group (the name was fashioned to resmble fan and skinhead :firms;), but we do not know whether he was indeed a member of he said group and what were his campaign slogans. It is known, however, that his local campaign was supported by the Communist Party, rather than LDPR.
It is of interest that the :big; parties also intend to play on the nationalist field.
So, during two weeks in February, in anticipation of the big elections day on 11 March[4], the Fair Russia Party got involved in three nationalist scandals at once. While the anti-Tatar picket in Samara (held on 16 February under the slogans :A Tatar has no place on the Russian TV" and :The Fair Russia Party will free the Samara TV Company from the Tatar yoke;) can be explained as :Black PR; and an attempt to by someone outside the party to undermine its reputation on the eve of elections, another scandal, in Krasnoyarsk - where the party's candidate list included Oleg Paschenko, a well-known anti-Semitist whom the local Jewish community had been trying to prosecute for incitement to ethnic hatred for years - certainly occurred by design. The Fair Russia Party did not only fail to delete the candidate in question from the list following the scandal started by CPRF, but verbally supported him[5] (while a vague statement by Fair Russia Party leader Sergey Mironov concerning :a decision made in principle to oust Oleg Paschenko from the party; had no apparent consequences - at least, according to the Krasnoyarsk Election Committee, he remained a Fair Russia candidate[6]). The third scandal broke out in mid-February, when the party presented its Pobeda (Victory) Project for youth. The project leader Yuri Lopusov was interviewed about the project and voiced citations from Mein Kampf without quotation marks, which was immediately noticed by observers. Notably, even though the interview was promptly removed from their website, the party never challenged the critical remarks, while Yuri Lopusov remained an official of the Fair Russia Party.
Similarly, the United Russia Party in February 2007 announced the launch of a so-called Russian Project - some sort of discussion of the Russian ethnicity and its implications - the meaning of this discussion appears unclear to the initiators themselves. Even if we assume that they are driven by noble and harmless intentions (such as debating the formation of a civic nation, etc.), we can predict the results by looking at the announced discussion panel, including, for example, Mikhail Yuriev - the author of The Fortress Russia, a scandalous article published in 2005 and immediately labeled a Manifesto of Russian Fascism, or Alexander Vassoyevich, an active right-wing radical from St. Petersburg and a consistent participant of the anti-Semitic Nasha Strategia program televised in late 2005 by TV-3. [7]
Counteraction to Radical Nationalism
Criminal Prosecution of the Right-Wing Radicals
In the winter months of 2006 and 2007, counteraction to right-wing radical nationalism was mainly exercised by law enforcement authorities opening criminal investigations into racist violence and propaganda.
The winter of 2006 - 2007 was marked by a series of trials of right-wing radicals. Within the three winter months, at least 10 trials ended in criminal sentences against 23 individuals, all sentences taking into account the hate motive. We note that none of the 10 trials was in Moscow, so we have to admit once again that the law enforcement against racist violence is concentrated in provinces (with the only exception of a sentence against Ruslan Melnik in St. Petersburg, the other sentences were passed in Yekaterinburg (two), Ufa, Nizhny Novgorod, Voronezh, Tambov, Kaluga, Yaroslavl, and Krasnoyarsk). Again, we note a high proportion of probational sentences: seven of the 23 convicted individuals (i.e. one out of three) were released on probation. We have repeatedly emphasized that tolerance towards violent racist offenders effectively encourages skinheads who find time and again that their risk of facing real punishment for their crimes is very low.
Increasingly, law enforcement agencies recognize the neo-Nazi motives of blast attacks. Moreover, they do so not only in obvious cases (such as the attack against an antifascist in Moscow described above), but also in cases with less manifest neo-Nazi motives (e.g. a series of blasts in St. Petersburg in the winter of 2007).
As opposed to racist violence, racist campaigning is traditionally prosecuted less often - just four sentences over the past winter. Probational sentences were meted out to two of the five defendants - i.e. they were effectively released from punishment - while two others were sentenced to real prison terms: Igor Mogilyov from Astrakhan Oblast and Pavel Ivanov from Novgorod.
Usually, we oppose imprisonment for :campaigning; - i.e. for :words;, but nevertheless we believe that Pavel Ivanov's sentence was well-founded and rightly severe. Moreover, we should emphasize that the Novgorod Prosecutor's Office and courts, once again, set an example of bringing right-wing radical offenders to justice. Back in 2004, Pavel Ivanov was convicted under art. 282 and then, after long judicial battles, got away with a probational sentence without any other punishment. As we have emphasized on many occasions, such sentences do not deter right-wing radicals who resume their activity as soon as they step out of the court building. Pavel Ivanov was no exception and got back to publishing Russkoye Veche - a paper with pronounced anti-Semitic content. So this time the judgment said that in Ivanov's case :reformation is impossible without a real deprivation of freedom.; In addition to imprisonment, Ivanov was banned from journalism and publishing for two years.
In early 2007, following a two-years' interval, [8] two judgments found certain materials to be extremist. These judgments were produced by Severodvinsky City Court (Arkhangelsk Oblast) with regard to Orangevaya Kolba, an article written by leader of the local NDPR chapter Georgy Znamensky, and by Perovsky District Court of Moscow with regard to two books produced by right-wing fantasy writer Yuri Petukhov.
We would particularly emphasize the judgment passed in Archangelsk, where the prosecution was triggered by the publication of the entire article in a local paper, whereas a shorter (and less explicit) version of the same article had been published in Sovetskaya Rossiya, a central paper. The defense referred to the fact that the publication in Sovetskaya Rossiya had not been addressed by the law enforcement. The court, however, rejected the argument and found that the final paragraph of the text as it was published by the local paper contained a call to extremist activity, namely "take baseball bats and hit the streets of cities."
Besides, over the past winter, the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg issued judgments on two applications relevant to the ultra right-wing activity in Russia. Both judgments were against the nationalists. On 12 December, ECHR rejected an application brought by RONS leader I. Artyomov in 2005 after all Russian courts denied RONS official registration as a political party, because their name contained the words "Russian national." Two days later, on 14 December, the Court ruled in favor of Volgograd journalist Anatoly Karman who had been struggling for years to be found non-guilty of defamation against Volgograd anti-Semitist Stanislav Terekhov whom the journalist had called :a local neo-fascist.; [9]
Excessive and Unfounded Actions against Extremism
Lawmaking
Over the winter months, the lawmaking ostensibly aimed at :fighting extremism; - as it had been the case ever before - effectively targeted civil liberties in Russia with more restrictions.
In particular, on 5 December 2006, amendments to the federal law on Main Guarantees of Electoral Rights and the Right to Participate in a Referendum and the Civil Procedure Code came into effect. By these amendments, a candidate or a list of candidates may be denied registration, or their current registration may be annulled, should they be found to have engaged in extremist activities; moreover, candidates may be punished for their alleged extremism retroactively, because the amended law allows looking into their past activities over a period equal to their prospective period in office, if elected. The amendments, though, will not be applied retroactively. However, starting in January 2007, any acts potentially interpreted as extremist (and we will explain below why the possibilities for such interpretation are extremely broad) may deny someone a possibility of being elected in the future. Since March, other laws relevant to elections have been amended pursuant to the above provision.
On 18 December 2006, the Moscow City Duma initiated the drafting of a law prohibiting mass media from mentioning the ethnicity of people involved in criminal episodes (victims as well as perpetrators); in March 2007 the draft was tabled before the State Duma. Speaker of the Moscow city legislature Vladimir Platonov argued for the prohibition by saying, in particular, that consistent reference to certain ethnic groups in crime reports may incite the public to racial hatred and animosity against these ethnic groups. We agree with V. Platonov's argument - in fact, in our reports focusing on hate speech we have described the mechanism of ethnic stereotyping in media reporting of crime. On the other hand, in many instances the prohibition would be simply absurd. We believe that imposing legal restrictions on mentioning people's ethnicity in the media is just another inappropriate attempt to limit the freedom of expression. The use of certain terms in print and broadcast media should be subject to corporate and public debates, rather than legal bans.
The Christmas holidays were followed immediately by a scandal triggered by the introduction, on 17 January 2007, of draft amendments to the Federal Law on Meetings, Rallies, Demonstrations, Marches, and Pickets; the draft was launched by members of the United Russia Party, LDPR, and Baburin's Rodina Party.
In addition to restricting meetings and marches at the time of elections, the draft effectively prohibited anyone with a history of liability (not limited to criminal liability) under anti-extremist provisions from organizing public events. This law, if adopted, would have opened up unlimited possibilities for bureaucratic abuse. A few days later, however - on 22 January, the draft was withdrawn by the authors :for making some improvements;, and still later, on 24 January it was abandoned altogether. It is obvious though that the President's Administration, rather than the scandal, caused the draft law to be abandoned: on 19 January, Vladislav Surkov said that the draft law should be made less restrictive.
In addition to lawmaking, inappropriate anti-extremist enforcement practices continued and sometimes assumed weird and paradoxical forms.
Judicial Enforcement
We will only mention the judgments in question, as we have already discussed the cases in detail.
Hereditary priest of the Mari faith and local oppositional activist Vitali Tanakov was found guilty on 25 December 2006; charges under art. 282 of the Criminal Code had been triggered by his brochure The Priest Speaks. The court found Tanakov guilty of offending other people on the grounds of their ethnicity and attitudes to religion, and he was also found guilty of incitement to hatred against a certain social group (the :social group; in question meant the Government of the Mari El Republic) and sentenced to 120 hours of correctional labor. [10]
On 26 December 2006, the Civil Law Judicial Collegium of the Moscow City Court upheld the prosecutorial warning issued to Memorial Human Rights Society in February for their publication of Mufti Nafigulla Ashirov's opinion concerning four Hizb ut-Tahrir brochures. To remind, Mufti Ashirov did not express solidarity with Hizb ut-Tahrir ideas, nor did he quote the reviewed texts, but stated only that in his opinion, the content of these brochures was not extremist. [11]
On 23 January 2007, the Russian Supreme Court upheld the judgment of Nizhny Novgorod Oblast Court of 13 October 2006 ordering liquidation of the Russian-Chechen Friendship Society. The :RCFS case; contains a paradox: formally, the judgment against the organization is consistent with the laws on voluntary associations and on Combating Extremist Activity; however, this judgment was based on an earlier, unlawful judgment against Stanislav Dmitrievsky, leader of the organization, who in February 2006 was found guilty of incitement to ethnic hatred on the basis of far-fetched accusations. [12]
Administrative Arbitrariness
Administrative arbitrariness under the pretext of fighting extremism is even more common and sometimes assumes paradoxical forms.
In the winter of 2006 - 2007, authorities continued their persecution of independent newspaper Zyryanskaya Zhizn - to remind, in end-2005 the newspaper faced an unfair, as we believe, warning by Rosokhrankultura for allegedly extremist reporting of local nationalists' meetings. The first warning resulted in closure of the printed version, but the newspaper continued to be published on the internet.
On 27 November 2006, they published an interview with the Komi Republic Ombudsman Leonid Vokuyev including the official's questionable comments on extremism. [13] One such comment - :a Yid is a Yid even if he is in Africa; - was also used as the title of the interview. This title, and also two quotes from songs by Aquarium and Instruction for Survival groups were used as pretexts to issue a second :anti-extremism" warning to the paper within one year and eventually request a court to liquidate the publication. In fact, authorities seek liquidation of the paper for a reported statement of a government official, even though the newspaper reporters never expressed solidarity with the statement, and the official himself faced no charges or complaints.
A case even more exotic was reported in Tyumen Oblast, where the local department of the Federal Registration Service referred to the Law on Combating Extremist Activity to deny registration to The Rainbow House, [14] a LGBT group in Tyumen. The Registration Service argued that :the group's activity involving propaganda of non-traditional sexual orientation may undermine the security of the Russian society and state due to the following circumstances:
- they undermine spiritual values of the society;
- they undermine the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Russian Federation due to reduction of its population."
While these two cases appear fairly exotic and the judicial appeal proceedings are not over, i.e. there is hope that common sense may eventually prevail, administrative abuse of anti-extremist provisions to suppress public protests has become an established practice. A high-profile example of such abuse last winter was the confiscation of promotional materials printed by the United Civic Front (UCF) for the March of the Dissenters scheduled on 16 December 2006 and banned by the Moscow City authorities. The print-run was seized on 12 December during a search in the UCF office - allegedly, to review the publications "for extremism", even though a dozen copies would have been sufficient for such review.
Administrative and judicial pressure against activists critical of the current regime in general or certain officials in particular has been accompanied by a blame campaign unleashed by Nashi movement, labeling oppositional activists as :fascists; and human rights defenders as :fascist accomplices;. Their campaign consistently uses phrases like :...'orange' oppositionist Mikhail Kasyanov, the most public fascist in the country Edouard Limonov, ardent admirer of liberal fascists Irina Khakamada, and the convicted famous "privatizer of people's property' Mikhail Khodorkovsky.; [15] In February 2006, Boris Yakemenko published an article which said, in particular, :[Human rights defenders] defended everything and everyone that weakened and humiliated Russia. And because nothing has harmed Russia more than fascism, the spiral of human rights movement should have invariably led at its next stage to defending the rights of humiliated and offended fascists.; [16]
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[1] Except in the spring and autumn of 2006, where the number of victims of racist violence did not increase as compared to the previous corresponding season, we have observed a consistent 20 to 30% increase of victims in each corresponding season of the next year (our observations date back to early 2004). To remind, in 2006, the overall number of victims increased by 17% as compared to 2005.
[2] Those who joined the party included veterans of the Russian National Unity who had left Barkashov at some point - Alexander Rashitsky and Yuri Vassin, and co-organizer of the infamous SPAS bloc at the 1999 elections Vladimir Davidenko. In February, the party was denied registration.
[3] Elections to the Moscow Oblast Duma took place on 11 March.
[4] Elections were held in 14 subjects of the Russian Federation.
[5] Oleg Paschenko will be defended from attacks by political opponents // Independent News Agency (Krasnoyarsk). 2007. 6 March (http://www.24rus.ru/more.php?UID=11141).
[6] As of April 7, 2007.
[7] 10 Russian questions of the United Russia Party // Kreml.org. 2007. February (http://www.kreml.org/news/141025386).
[8] We refer to the judgments known to us which at the time of this writing - April 2007 - were 9, including year 2007.
[9] See details of these cases in: G. Kozhevnikova. Radical Nationalism and Efforts to Counteract It in 2006 // SOVA Center. Nationalism and Xenophobia in Russia. 2007. 1 April (http://xeno.sova-center.ru/29481C8/8F76150).
[10] In March 2007, the Supreme Court of the Republic upheld the verdict. See details in Alexander Verkhovsky, Olga Sibireva, Problems with the Exercise of the Freedom of Conscience in Russia // SOVA Center. Religion in a secular society. 2007. 22 March (http://religion.sova-center.ru/publications/8EA1CC7/8EA1EB3).
[11] See details in: Ibid.
[12] See details in G. Kozhevnikova. Radical Nationalism and Efforts to Counteract It in 2006.
[13] To rule out doubts as to the accuracy of the quotation, a video-recording of the interview was posted on the web.
[14] LGBT stands for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender.
[15] Nizhny Novgorod: Know the traitor! // Nashi movement 2007. 14 March (http://www.nashi.su/news/14482). The action :Know the traitor!; depicting oppositional politicians as :admirers; and :supporters; of fascists has been held by Nashi for a few months in a number of Russian cities.
[16] Boris Yakemenko. Limonov's followers bury human rights defenders // Dni.ru. 2007. 2 February (http://www.dni.ru/news/pk/2007/2/2/98822.html).
