Russia’s Anti-Fascists Fight Back
by Nickolai Butkevich
3 January 2007
Attacks by Russian right-wing extremists appear to be picking up at
an alarming pace.
Russians are often accused of being politically apathetic. In the
face of the stifling political conformity and media censorship of the
Putin era, most have reacted with a shrug, seemingly content that at
least the chaos and privations of the 1990s have been put firmly
behind them.
The main exceptions to this rule are the politically active segments
of the country’s youth, dominated largely by extremists of both the
left wing and nationalist right. Both extremes appear to be growing
in both membership and political clout – witness the unconscionable
inclusion of the National Bolsheviks in the "Other Russia" coalition
and the growing flirtation between certain State Duma deputies and
neo-Nazi groups.
But there are also healthier trends at work in Russia’s youth
culture, specifically the small but growing ranks of anti-fascists.
Unfortunately, this fledgling movement has come under increasing
attack by neo-Nazis and is subject to indifference and often outright
hostility from the police.
In 2006, neo-Nazi youth groups escalated their campaign of murders
and assaults against anti-fascists in an organized effort to squash
the only segment of Russian society that actively opposes their plans
to create a "Russia for the Russians."
MERE HOOLIGANISM?
Several recent reports illustrate the extent of the problem.
The most recent of these incidents took place on 22 December when
neighbors discovered a bomb placed outside the home of anti-fascist
activist Tigran Babadzhanian in Moscow. According to articles
published in the national daily Komsomolskaya Pravda on 23 and 25
December, a poster attached to the bomb had a swastika drawn on it
along with racist threats against the Babadzhanian family, who are
ethnic Armenians. Babadzhanian regularly attends anti-fascist events
and visits neo-Nazi Internet forums to argue against their extremist
ideology. A police source told the newspaper that neo-Nazis regularly
harassed him and painted threats on the walls of his building.
Police tried to disarm the explosive device, but it went off and
injured four officers and a police dog. Despite the evidence pointing
to a hate crime – three suspects identified by police allegedly
belong to an extremist nationalist gang – investigators are treating
the incident as a case of simple "hooliganism."
Russian police often appear to take this approach when faced with
racially-motivated violent crime. Take, for example, the murder of
the Moscow-based anti-fascist activist Aleksandr Ryukhin. Last 16
April, Ryukhin and a friend who managed to escape were stabbed by six
youths. In the apartments of the three suspects apprehended thus far
in the case, police found nationalist literature and leaflets as well
as video recordings of attacks on other victims. Moreover, the
suspects have been linked to extremist neo-Nazi groups including the
infamous Slavic Union (SS in Russian).
Nevertheless, according to a 30 November posting on the Russian human
rights website hro.org, the three will be charged with "hooliganism."
Investigators, however, have indicated that the three suspects who
are still at large will be charged with murder – if they are ever
caught.
One person who has publicly taken issue with the tendency to charge
assailants of anti-fascists and ethnic minorities with hooliganism is
Irina Kacharava, the mother of St. Petersburg anti-fascist leader
Timur Kacharava, who was killed in November 2005.
In a 1 December interview on hro.org, Irina Kacharava gives police
credit for arresting seven suspects in her son’s murder. But she said
the official explanation that Timur was killed "as a result of
hooliganistic actions" both defames her son by implying that he was a
common street brawler who got what was coming to him, and plays down
the planned nature of the killing.
Timur Kacharava, a vegetarian and a pacifist, was killed after
distributing food to homeless people, his mother said, activity that
would hardly be of interest to a "typical hooligan." He had been
attacked before, on the metro and on the street. As they beat
Kacharava, his assailants taunted him by asking: "What do you think,
is it good to be an anti-fascist?"
THE BACKLASH
As 2006 drew to a close, assaults on anti-fascists appeared to pick
up at an alarming pace. According to a 27 November article in the
newspaper Moskovsky Komsomolets, police covered up a brawl involving
an estimated 200 neo-Nazis and anti-fascists on 18 November at
Moscow’s Baumanskaya metro station. Dozens were injured in the fight
and several arrests were made on both sides.
St. Petersburg was the scene of two violent attacks in December. As
dozens of anti-fascist demonstrators gathered for an anti-war rally
on 3 December, some 30 neo-Nazis assaulted them, screaming "Forward
Russia!" Then, on 10 December, skinheads attacked a group of
anti-fascists who were handing out food to homeless people.
The problem is not confined to Moscow and St. Petersburg. Similar
attacks occurred in 2006 in Lipetsk, Ryazan, Syktyvkar, Oryol, and
Vladivostok.
Disgracefully, the Russian government has mostly ignored this issue.
Several attacks against anti-fascists remain unsolved and top
officials have consistently failed to condemn them. This may have
something to do with the political views of these activists. Many –
with the exception of the ersatz anti-fascists from the pro-Putin
"Nashi" movement – embrace a brand of far-left politics that is
extremely critical of the Kremlin. Additionally, some elements in the
anti-fascist movement have become increasingly violent. They justify
their readiness to fight back by saying that the government is not
doing enough to suppress skinhead violence.
This is not, I’m afraid, a hollow argument. If law enforcement
officials continue to cover up reports of neo-Nazi violence while at
the same time the government caters to nationalists by banning
foreigners from trading in markets and launching police sweeps
against ethnic Georgians, the counter-reaction from anti-fascists and
many other victims of nationalist violence in Russia will only grow
fiercer. If the cliche about young people being the nation’s future
has any merit, it’s clear that the country can ill afford to lose
such politically active and well-intentioned youths to the
temptations of extremism.
Nickolai Butkevich is research director at the Union of Councils for
Jews in the Former Soviet Union.