Racism and Xenophobia in Russia. Summary, August 2012

In August 2012 at least 15 people were injured due to racist and neo-Nazi attacks in the Moscow and Moscow region, St. Petersburg, Orel region, and the Republics of Bashkortostan and Tatarstan. Approximately one third of these victims were injured on the 2^nd of August, a national day of celebrations dedicated to the Russian Airborne Troops. In connection to this event at least 5 people were injured in 4 different regions of the country due to racist attacks by drunken paratroopers.

In addition, during August 2012 several Orthodox activists in Moscow attacked people and organizations that, in one way or another, demonstrated support for the punk-group «Pussy Riot».

In August there was a number of conflicts involving people of different ethnicities. The conflicts started for different reasons but all had xenophobic overtones. The most notable of these conflicts was the clash between local people and Roma in the village of ‘Krotovka’ in the Samara region, as well as the attack on the vendors at the ‘Southern Market’ in Stavropol.

It is of importance to mention the events in the village ‘Pobeda’ in the Leningrad region. Outraged by a rape of a woman, the local residents did not only expel all the foreign workers from the village but also personally chased these ‘illegals’ around the local area, beating them and then handing them over to the police. This happened in spite of the fact that the crime was immediately solved as the perpetrator was instantly detained and found guilty.

Overall, since the beginning of this year, 12 people have been killed and 129 people injured in racist violence, 1 person received death threats; these events have played out in 21 Russian regions.

In August there has been a record of numerous cases of racist behaviour among football fans. For instance, a supporter group of FC ‘Zenit’- the football hooligans group –“Snake City Firm” in St. Petersburg, beat up a group of natives of the North Caucasus, as they were headed to Moscow to watch a game against the Makhachkala team "Anji". In Moscow, on the eve of the match, a xenophobic banner was hung up directed to the fans of "Anji".

In August, there were at least 15 acts of neo-Nazi vandalism in 11 regions of the country. Two-thirds of these acts were carried out on Orthodox sites (10 cases), and were all associated with the announcement of the sentence of “Pussy Riot” on August 17.

In addition, the vandals damaged several Muslim and Protestant buildings, Pentecostal Church (1 case) and Vladimir Lenin monuments (2 cases). Overall, since the beginning of this year, we have recorded attacks on at least 64 sites in 30 regions of the country.

The SOVA-Center has not come across any information about convictions, carried out in August, in cases of racist violence motivated by hatred. In total since the beginning of this year at least 16 verdicts have been issued against 45 people.

We should mention the verdict issued on August 8 by the Tverskoy Court of Moscow convicting Nikolai Dvoynyakov, Vitaliy Vasin, Vladimir Kirpichnikov and Gregory Bilchenko on charges of rioting at Manezhnaya Square on December 11, 2010. Depending on their individual acts, each of the young men were found guilty according to different articles of the Criminal Code (e.g. participation in mass riots, violence against a public officer, hooliganism) and each sentenced to different terms, from two years of probation to three years of actual imprisonment. Hate motivation was not taken into account in these articles. One of the accused, V. Kirpichnikov, was however in addition convicted by part 1 of article 282 (incitement to ethnic hatred).

In August 2012 at least 4 verdicts were issued against 4 people for xenophobic propaganda - in Moscow, Vologda and Novosibirsk regions and the Republic of Bashkortostan. Altogether in 2012, 50 verdicts were issued in cases of racist propaganda in 33 regions of the country, accordingly 71 people were convicted.

During the past month the Federal List of Extremist Materials, compiled by the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation, was extended to include paragraphs 1365-1426.

The list has been extended with for example: xenophobic materials, including videos from the online social network "Vkontakte", publication from the site "Rehabilitation swastika. For people of good will",

the newspaper "Orthodox Rus", an article from the newspaper "Cossack View",

the book "The Russian Orthodox Church and the Modern Pre-Antichrist Era", some comments from the social network website "Odnoklassniki",an article by Alexander Dugin, islamic materials including the websites “Kavkazinform”, “Islamdin”, hunafa.com, lectures by Khamidullin, an ideologist from religious association "At-Takfir wal-Hegira", muslim religious works, including an essay of medieval Islamic theologian al-Ghazali and the website of the Azerbaijani Islamic independent news publication milleti-ibrahim.info, a book by Svetlana Ziyarvoy, "Back From the Future", several issues of the magazine "Zvezda Selennoy”.

Some parts of this ban are, in our opinion, wrongly imposed.

In August, the Moscow City Court classified the interregional civil association the "Northern Brotherhood" (Severnoe Bratstvo) as an extremist organization. In total there are 29 organizations of this kind published on the official website of the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation (terrorist organizations are not included.)