03 December 2005, 17:02 Society

The radicals were given an election bloc

Andrei Stenin In the Ozersky district, the leader of the RNE*, Alexander Barkashov, was detained for hooliganism, and in a Moscow apartment, employees of the Organized Crime Control Department blocked the leadership of the NBP*. It is possible that in this way law enforcement agencies will neutralize radicals before Sunday’s elections to the Moscow City Duma.

On Saturday it became known that the night before police detained the leader of Russian National Unity (RNE) Alexander Barkashov and four of his associates. According to information from the Central Internal Affairs Directorate of the Moscow Region, in the afternoon, employees of the regional Organized Crime Control Department carried out “operational activities” in the Ozersky district of the Moscow region. In the village of Sennitsy, where the house owned by Barkashov is located , a conflict and fight occurred between operatives and members of the RNU. One police officer was injured.

Barkashov himself and four of his supporters were taken to the Internal Affairs Directorate of the city of Ozyory, where a criminal case was opened against them under Part 2 of Art. 213 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (“hooliganism associated with resistance to a representative of the authorities”).

According to some reports, they now remain in custody.

What exactly caused the fight between RNU activists and police officers is not yet known. Moscow region police officers refused to provide details of what happened in Sennitsy. The RNU headquarters also commented extremely sparingly on what happened. “There is a provocation,” RNE activists told Gazeta.Ru. “It’s no coincidence that everything happened on the days of the Nativity Fast.” However, the interlocutor of Gazeta.Ru could not explain the meaning of the provocation.

Meanwhile, in Moscow, the police siege of the apartment of the press secretary of another radical organization, the National Bolshevik Party (NBP), continues.

The day before, at noon, employees of the capital's Organized Crime Control Department called the apartment of NBP press secretary Alexander Averin and demanded to open the door. who were in the apartment at that moment, However, the National Bolsheviks Vladimir Abel (Linderman), Roman Popkov, Maxim Gasovich, Dmitry Sumin and Averin himself, refused to do this. Then, according to the stories of Limonovites, the police tried to break down the steel door - and even called rescuers from the Ministry of Emergency Situations with equipment. At this moment, State Duma deputy from the Rodina faction Viktor Alksnis arrived at house 16 on Staroalekseevskaya Street . In his presence, the UBOP officers did not break down the door without a court order. Alksnis later left, promising to return immediately if the police continued to break into apartment No. 51. At night, a police picket was posted on the area in front of the door. The entrance to the entrance was blocked by law enforcement officers. Residents of the house were allowed inside only upon presentation of a passport with registration. And 13 NBP activists who came to support Averin were detained “for obscene language.” (Three hours after the arrest, all the National Bolsheviks were released to their homes.)

The police give conflicting information about the reasons for the storming of Averin’s apartment.

Initially, on Friday afternoon, the North-Eastern Administrative District Internal Affairs Directorate said that the UBOP officers, together with the district police officer, were conducting a planned inspection of apartments in which previously convicted citizens, as well as members of radical parties, live, and explained such security measures by the upcoming elections to the Moscow City Duma .

However, a few hours later, the head of the Internal Affairs Directorate of the North-Eastern District, Viktor Trutnev, arrived at the scene and announced a new version, saying that explosive devices and weapons were supposedly stored in Averin’s apartment. To confirm this story, an explosives technician from the Moscow Central Internal Affairs Directorate and a service dog were called to Staroalekseevskaya. According to the Limonovites, the sapper wiped the apartment door with a cotton swab and left, but the dog did not smell the explosives.

As of 2:00 pm on Saturday, the police had not started using force. As Vladimir Abel reported, “now four or five operatives and a dog are sitting on the staircase near the apartment.” According to him, they are not going to break the door yet, waiting for the appropriate court decision. But Gazeta.Ru’s interlocutor expressed doubt that law enforcement agencies will be able to obtain a search warrant from a federal court, without which entry into a home is considered illegal. “The court will not release him without a criminal case,” Abel said.

The NBP believes that the actions of law enforcement agencies may also be directly related to the Sunday Duma elections.

“Of course, I can’t get into their head,” Abel told Gazeta.Ru over the phone, “but it is possible that the task of the police is to block active members of the NBP so that the party cannot influence the election results.” It is possible that the authorities were trying to prevent some protests that Limonovites might have planned for Sunday. However, according to another version of the National Bolsheviks, the siege of the apartment is only part of a large-scale action to evict Limonovites from apartments, which they often turn into headquarters. “Yesterday, Maxim Gasovich was evicted from an apartment on Orekhovoy Boulevard, ten people were detained there, who are now arrested for four days, and now for some reason operatives are sitting in his apartment,” said Vladimir Abel. — And on November 7, the Organized Crime Control Department forced the landlady to evict ten party members from a rented apartment in Belyaevo. The guys were also kicked out of their rented apartment in Lobnya. And, of course, you remember how we were evicted from the new bunker on Kashirskoye Highway.” Although the National Bolsheviks do not rule out that the goal of law enforcement agencies is to prevent the National Bolsheviks from registering a new organization to replace the Interregional Public Organization “National Bolshevik Party” banned by the Supreme Court.

This idea was prompted by the National Bolsheviks’ Friday search at Gasovich’s place, during which documents prepared for submission to the Registration Chamber of the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation were confiscated .

“If the documents are returned to us, then next week we will submit them to the chamber for registration,” Abel said. “Otherwise, our lawyers will restore them in two weeks.” The NBP especially noted that there are no important documents at the press secretary’s apartment and the police are “trying in vain.”

The National Bolsheviks say they are “determined to endure the siege.” They have enough food, since their comrades were able to give them everything they needed from the street (the apartment is located on the ninth floor). “At first they turned off our lights, but when the deputy arrived, they turned them on,” Abel noted. The police did not turn off the phone at all.

In addition, the besieged are going to write a complaint to the Moscow prosecutor's office if the police do not lift the blockade of the apartment by Monday and, thus, will not allow Limonovites to vote in the elections.

“The fact that they locked us in the apartment is a direct obstruction of the right to vote,” say the National Bolsheviks.