The case of "Khimki hostages" (guests of the program - I. Vasyunin and Yu. Bashinov)

Dmitry Volchek: On Monday, at a meeting of Dmitry Medvedev with rock musicians, the issue of the Khimkinsky forest was discussed. The president said that he intends to once again listen to the arguments of supporters of different options for laying the track - through the forest and bypassing, but it is clear to him that there is a good struggle with the best. None of the meeting participants, unfortunately, reminded Dmitry Medvedev that there were victims in this good struggle with the best. Two young people, participants in the anti -fascist movement, Alexei Gaskarov and Maxim Solopov, have been in the investigative insulator for the third month, they are accused of attacking the building of the Khimki administration. On October 15, the Mosobltsud canceled the decision of the Khimkinsky City Court on the extension of the arrest of Alexei Gaskarov, earlier the same decision was made in relation to Solopov. However, anti -fascists are in custody and are waiting for a new decision of the Khimki court. The case of Gaskarov and Solopov acquired a great resonance, the shares in Russia and abroad, in Sweden, Denmark, Ukraine, in France, were a picket in New York by the Russian representative office at the UN, a letter of human rights activists and cultural figures to the President of Russia in defense of young anti-fascists was published, a site was created to support them. I welcome in our studio to Yulia Bashinov, the campaign activist in defense of Gaskarov and Solopov, and the Rain television company Ilya Vasyunin, who was in Khimki on July 28 during the anti -fascist campaign at the building of the local administration.
Julia, good evening. Gaskarova and Solopov are called "Khimki hostages." Why hostages?

Julia Bashinova: Because there were violations during the arrest. They were not actually detained on suspicion of committing a crime, but took hostage because they are well -known public activists. And since they always declared themselves as anti -fascists, and the demonstration of the Khimki administration was carried out by anti -fascists, Alexei and Maxim became easy prey. Therefore, we believe that they are hostages.

Dmitry Volchek: Gaskarov and Solopov participated in the recording of one of the discussion programs of Radio Freedom from the Clubs cycle, and my colleague Elena Fanailova, who leads this program, says that they made a very great impression on her that these are very smart young people. And human rights activist Lev Ponomarev, who performed in the Moscow Regional Council yesterday, also talked about Alexei Gaskarov as a wonderful journalist and public figure. Do you know them well?

Julia Bashinova: Yes, with Maxim a little more than with Alexei. We intersected at anti -fascist events and other public initiatives.

Dmitry Volchek: Ilya, you witnessed the events of the Khimki administration, for the participation in which Gaskarov and Solopov threatens up to 7 years in prison. They say that on the well -known video that distributed on the Internet, neither Alexei nor Maxim. Why was they declared guilty?

Ilya Vasyunin: Indeed, on the record that hangs on YouTube, neither Lesha nor Maxim is visible. In fact, the Khimki police were powerless to do anything to suppress this action, unless, of course, she wanted to do it. Both activists were called for a preventive conversation the next day and actually detained in the police department, although one of them, Maxim, says that he was detained at the crime scene, and a day later. Therefore, they say that they are hostages; Because they are the most famous, the most public people who submitted applications for pickets, rallies openly performed, gave interviews. You remembered that they were on Radio Liberty, they could also constantly be seen in the plots of NTV, Ren-TV, and other television channels. The police followed the simplest way, it was necessary to put a checkmark, and took the most public people. Therefore, they are hostages, therefore, for people who advocate their release, it is important to defend them and ensure that they be released.

Dmitry Volchek: Ilya, are you also familiar with Alexei and Maxim well?

Ilya Vasyunin: Of course. I wrote at one time in the Novaya Gazeta about the anti -fascist movement, now on the Rain television channel I am shooting the stories related to the movement, and these were people who monitored the left movements and the life of their ideological opponents, ultra -right groups. And of course, they often had to communicate with them, they acted on experts on various issues.

Dmitry Volchek: The action of the Khimki administration was the result of an attack by a group of football hooligans (I don’t know if they can be called fascists, ultra -right) on the camp of the Khimkinsky forest defenders, and this attack is not investigated, and an attack on the Khimki administration, where several glasses were defeated, is investigated as if it were crime of paramount importance, therapy.

Ilya Vasyunin: That's right. In a well -known interview in the Kommersant newspaper, “each person has the right to 15 minutes of power”, one of the organizers said that in Khimki everything that left, anarchists, anti -fascists hate the most - corruption, arbitrariness of police, ultra -right groups, everything that can only be represented by the most terrible left -wing belief. Indeed, a few days before the attack on the administration, people with wrapped faces came to the camp, they had tattoos of the famous fan group “Gladiators”: there are witnesses who saw specific boar tattoos on different parts of the body. This group is known for being captured by the NBP bunker, she is also suspected of attacking the "march of disagreements". In the fan near -football environment, an ambiguous attitude towards her, because such open cooperation with law enforcement agencies is, of course, not welcome. Many people (these are in the photographs posted on the Internet) can be seen by runes that were used at one time as symbols in the SS troops. That is, everything is clear here.
Of course, if we speak in court and go to the police with this - all this must be checked and double -checked, but for street anti -fascists and anarchists there are no questions here: who are these people who have visited the ecologists camp, and whom they represent. It is clear that at first there can be environmentalists as victims: someone was beaten, talked, not very severe damage. But tomorrow these same people can go out and already on the street to perform actions much more serious. In fact, any of them may turn out to be a killer of anti -fascists. We know that such cases are not uncommon. Of course, it was impossible to ignore this, and this protest is dedicated to the fact that people who are potentially hostile to the left, for anarchists, are unpunished and actually enjoy the grace of law enforcement agencies. What this led to, we all see - huge scandals, great attention to the forest and the actions of the administration, and such consequences for the leaders of the anti -fascist movement.

Dmitry Volchek: I saw the phrase on the Khimkinsky hostage protection website: "Hunting for other participants in the anti -fascist movement is open." Dechane it, please. After all, hundreds of people after the July events were suspicious.

Julia Bashinova: Yes, after the arrest of Alexei and Maxim, mass repressions began against anti -fascists. Apparently, from the fact that there was no evidence of the involvement of Alexei and Maxim in some illegal actions, they began to catch at concerts, at other events of anti-fascists and anarchists dozens, tortured, beaten. There are several cases when people nevertheless decided to write a statement to the prosecutor’s office, received medical documents, removed beatings and somehow ready to fight further, but not everyone is ready to do it. Indeed, hunting was open, persecuted for beliefs. If you are an anti -fascist, you are under suspicion.

Dmitry Volchek: I want to recommend to the students the article by Elena Kostyleva published on the website of our radio station E. This is an agency that is designed to counteract extremism, but in fact it acts sometimes with extremist methods: people are grabbed on the streets, bring interrogations, beaten. It resembles some Latin American dictatorship. Ilya, maybe you will give some examples.

Ilya Vasyunin: In my opinion, 5 or 6 complaints reached the prosecutor's office, but much more people were detained, searched, spent time in police departments in the Moscow Region in other cities. I tried to speak with representatives of the police near Moscow. For example, I just want to move away from the anti-fascists a little and remember Evgeny Chirikov, she was also suspected that she somehow favored the shares of the Khimki administration. She had a press conference in an independent press center, after which the police near Moscow blocked the exit from this court, the journalists were cut off, the police officers were seized by Chirikov, and five employees of the operational regiment of the police near Moscow, she was pushed into the car. After that, I asked a question to the representative of the press service of the Central Internal Affairs Directorate of the Moscow Region, asked what caused the need for such a power detention by people from the Moscow Region, why Chirikov could not be invited to a conversation. To which I was given an answer that the Khimki court decided to force Evgeny Chirikov to the meeting, because she allegedly was not there. The most interesting thing is that they brought her not to the Khimki court, but these people brought her to the Main Investigative Department of the Moscow Region. That is, in fact, in front of the central channels, journalists, a huge number of activists, the courtyard is blocked in the very center of Moscow and such an abduction occurs. What to say then about 18-20-year-old people who suspect that they participated in something? During interrogations, investigators who talk with the suspects are trying to find out the main question - who gave the money. According to operational information, or five million rubles were spent on it, or something like that. Who gave money, some sponsor, who is behind this, who organized and so on. Activists, who have been in motion for many years, have come out of interrogations, amazed by this zeal to reveal the conspiracy - apparently, the American - against the Khimki administration, foreign aggression against Himitsa. Of course, the guys cannot argue to answer questions and call a lawyer. One of the young people was tortured, put on a bag on their heads.

Dmitry Volchek: Yes, this is Nikita Chernobaev.

Ilya Vasyunin: Nikita Chernobaev was tortured with a bag on his head, then he was forced to go to the hospital. The police came there for him, tried to extract him from there. Searches without a warrant, wrapped people in the middle of the night. The police officers came to the girl, the interns from Novaya Gazeta: first to her mother, then went to her without documents. The actions of the police are beyond good and evil. Now we are following complaints, we have only an unofficial response to the press service of the prosecutor’s office that, perhaps, people who were firmly addressed, they are not from the police.

Dmitry Volchek: Probably, the “gladiators” were sitting in the police department, they were again invited. But yesterday’s court hearing, nevertheless, speaks of a favorable turn of the case. The Khimkinsky city court is obliged to re -consider the issue of extending the preventive measure for Gaskarov until October 27, and the meeting in the Solopov case is scheduled for Monday. Is there any confidence that Alexei and Maxim will be released before the end of the month? Or there are no guarantees?

Julia Bashinova: Unfortunately, there are no guarantees. Of course, we very much hope that the Khimkinsky city court, since the decision on the detention was canceled by a higher court, will be forced to apply a different preventive measure. But the Moscow Regional Court made a very strange, half -hearted decision, canceling the content of the detention and at the same time extending this measure of restraint before the new court. Usually, when a decision on the maintenance of detention is canceled by a higher court, a person is released either in the court building where he is present, or from the pre -trial detention center where he is located while the meeting is coming. It is very strange and illegal that the guys are still behind bars. Maxim will sit 10 days before the new court. It is not known how much Alexey will sit. All these days they could be at large under the subscription about the lower away, or under the pledge, under house arrest.

Dmitry Volchek: human rights activist Lev Ponomarev, who was at a meeting of the Moscow Regional Council, also said that in fact Gaskarov and Solopov would have to be released immediately after the decision was made, but for some reason this was not done. By the way, release is half the battle, we need an acquittal.

Julia Bashinova: Of course.

Dmitry Volchek: The campaign itself, which you are in support of Gaskarov and Solopov, is amazing in the scope of the conduct and quality. There were pickets in different countries and collection of signatures, your site is very professionally made in seven languages, including Turkish. Is this all done by enthusiasts?

Julia Bashinova: Yes, of course. We were very lucky that we found like -minded people in many countries, international support shares were held in 12 countries, in 35 cities. This is even an unexpected scope for us. We are very grateful to everyone who took part in the days of uniform actions - it was very important. And I think that in the decisions of the Moscow Regional Court this played a big role. It seems to me that the Moscow Regional Court, on the one hand, drew attention to a public reaction to the process, and on the other hand, he did not want to take responsibility for the Khimki figures and allowed them to rake out what they had bore. I think that the half -heartedness is explained by this.

Dmitry Volchek: The next days of uniform actions in support of the “Khimki hostages” are appointed for November. By that time, they hope they will be released.

Julia Bashinova: We really hope for it. But, nevertheless, while we are calling for the days of uniform actions from November 12 to 15. And we really hope that they will pass with no less scope.

Dmitry Volchek: And also in different countries of the world?

Julia Bashinova: Of course, we try to spread the call as wider as possible and translate into all languages. We need to thank our translators, these are people from different countries, wrote to us themselves, offered help.