Moscow Times. 24 April 2001. President Urges War Against Racism. Excerpts. President Vladimir Putin ordered the police to crack down on racially motivated attacks Monday after a spate of weekend incidents involving skinheads left one person dead and 10 injured. Putin told a Cabinet meeting that the number of racially motivated attacks is growing and urged the police to take steps to protect minorities. "For Russia, which is a multiracial country, this is absolutely unacceptable," Putin was quoted by Itar-Tass as saying. The frequency of racially motivated attacks in Russia is unclear. Police and human rights groups do not keep records, while victims themselves often don't report attacks for fear that they will face fresh abuse at the hands of the authorities. However, anecdotal evidence suggests that an increasing number of attacks are being carried out and that skinheads are largely responsible. Gabriel Walder Fekadu, an Ethiopian agricultural specialist who has lived here for over a decade, said he was attacked by skinheads on the metro last month. A gang of about 30 youths, shouting racial slurs, charged into the train car he was riding when it stopped at the Komsomolskaya metro. Fekadu said they beat him and then fled before the train departed. Fekadu, 37, said that tough economic and social conditions make for a fertile ground for racially motivated attacks. "Everybody is unhappy, everybody is looking for someone to blame their unhappiness on," he said. Also last month, Patrick Budenko, a Sierra Leonian student of international law, had to get three stitches after being hit on the head with a beer bottle during an attack in the Prospekt Mira metro, said Noel Calhoun, coordinator of social ministries at the Moscow Protestant Chaplaincy, where Budenko worships... "We've noticed that there has been an upward trend in recent months," said Calhoun. Gabriel Kotchofa, president of the Association of Foreign Students of Russia, agreed that violence against minorities is on the rise. Kotchofa, who is also a professor of oil and gas geology, said he has counted 11 attacks in April alone. "April is the worst month of all every year," he said. "The attacks now occur during the day in the crowded metro carriages or metro underpasses." Some say there is always a surge in attacks at the end of April, when skinheads go on rampages to celebrate Adolf Hitler's April 20 birthday. On Saturday, Mayerbek Yelesayev, an 18-year-old native of the Chechen town Argun, was stabbed to death after he approached a group of skinheads outside the Manezh shopping mall who had insulted him. The day before, a gang of up to 150 shaven-headed youth wearing camouflage pants and combat boots attacked an outdoor food market in southwestern Moscow. The attackers beat up many of the vendors, who were mostly dark-skinned Azeri natives, before police arrived. The Kommersant newspaper described the incident Monday as a pogrom. ... "We are afraid to go out of the hostel to buy bread," said an Ethiopian student at the University of Peopleís Friendship who says he faces almost daily harassment. He refused to give his name, saying he feared the university would punish him. The student said skinheads often come to the hostel and shout racial slurs at black residents. "We consider our hostel as a prison," he said. Indifference on the part of the police and ordinary citizens is paving the way for racially motivated violence, said Valentin Gefter, head of the Human Rights Institute. "Against the backdrop of racial intolerance we see no adequate response from the police," Gefter said. ... Police spokesman Vladimir Zubkov said no statistics are kept on the number of skinheads in Moscow because the crimes they commit are considered teenage hooliganism. Despite Putin's call Monday for a crackdown on racially motivated attacks, it was unclear what he wanted the police to do. ... Fekadu, the agricultural specialist, said police are usually of little help to victims, refusing to even write up reports about the incidents. "The policeman told me, 'They [the attackers] are gone anyway, where am I supposed to look for them?'" Those who do report abuse to the police may end up being detained themselves, agreed Calhoun. Svetlana Gannushkina of the Civil Assistance human rights group said she receives at least a dozen complaints a week from people upset about police lawlessness. _______________________________________________ Leninist-International mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.wwpublish.com/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international
