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Date: April 30, 2024 Tue
Time: 12:18 am
Time: 12:18 am
Results for racist crimes
1 results foundAuthor: LeGendre, Paul Title: Minorities Under Siege: Hate Crimes and Intolerance in the Russian Federation Summary: There has been no respite for Russias minorities in the past year from violent attacks motivated by bias, with any given week marred by serious assaults or racist murders. Although no official statistics are available, a leading Russian nongovernmental monitor of hate crimes documented 31 racist murders in 2005 and hate-based attacks on 413 individuals, while estimating that the real number of violent attacks is far higher. In the first four months of 2006, attacks appeared to escalate with 15 racist murders and hate-based attacks on 114 individuals. In April 2006 alone at least nine people were victims of racist murders. One nine-yearold girl suffered multiple stab wounds but survived. Those who are vulnerable to hate crimes include both foreigners and Russia nationals with a non-Slavic appearance. Non-Slavic people from the Russian Federations republics in the Caucasus who are Russian citizens are as much targets of racist violence as are recent immigrants from the now independent republics of the former Soviet Union. Particularly high levels of racist violence are directed toward people from the Caucasus, in part in response to the war in Chechnya and associated terrorist attacks in Russian towns and cities. Attacks motivated by racism sometimes have an overlay of religious hatred and intolerance: most people from the Caucasus are Muslims or of non-Orthodox Christian faiths. At the same time, reporting of attacks on people from these areas probably remains the least comprehensive, as these victims also tend to fear police abuse or arrest and are least likely to report racist attacks. Attacks on the Jewish community build on deeply rooted antisemitism that has found new voices, while Russias scattered Roma sometimes known as gypsies face violent attacks as part of longstanding patterns of discrimination and social marginalization by both the state and civil society. People of African origin have been the object of persistent and serious attacks, with African students in particular subject to everyday threats of violence. In addition to visible minorities, identified through their skin color, culture, or language, bias crimes target members of religions that are considered non-traditional, from Jehovahs Witnesses to Baptists, Roman Catholics, and Hare Krishnas. Those whose minority status is due to their sexual orientation also have become targets of bias-based violence. Victims of hate crimes have likewise included those who are taking action against racism and intolerance. Human rights and anti-racism campaigners, including young people who speak out against racism through music and groups that call themselves anti-Fascist, have engaged in growing protests against extremist violence and are increasingly themselves the victims. The perpetrators are drawn typically from ordinary citizens who are receptive to a pervasive message of hatred and fear of those who do not fit an ethnic Russian, Orthodox Christian ideal. Tens of thousands of mostly young people have been mobilized in a loosely organized movement of skinheads united by extreme nationalist ideology, sometimes in frank imitation of Germanys National Socialists. Whereas in the past skinheads were an important factor only in the larger cities, they are now often present in smaller cities and towns, and they also have become increasingly bold in their public presence. A recent eyewitness account told of a group of some 30 skinheads marching in formation through a central Moscow metro station shouting racist slogans. Such accounts are no longer a rarity. The violence is being perpetrated in an atmosphere in which the xenophobic and racist discourse is not limited to extremist groups, but has extended into the mainstream through political parties and the media. Such discourse is increasingly a part of mainstream politics as evidenced by the racist campaign rhetoric in last years Moscow Duma (Parliament) election, which led to the barring of one political party from the election race. Xenophobic statements by political leaders and media coverage have an influence on public opinion by exacerbating preexisting fears and prejudices and a recent survey shows high levels of xenophobic sentiment in the population at large. Russian laws today provide a basis for the investigation and prosecution of crimes motivated by racial, ethnic, or religious bias. The Russian Criminal Code contains a general penalty enhancement provision for the commission of crimes with a motive of national, racial, religious hate or enmity Several other articles of the Code provide specific enhanced punishments for particular crimes committed with these motivations. Russian law also contains provisions to punish incitement to hatred. Yet, despite the generally sound legal basis with which to address racist violence, those responsible for these crimes operate with relative impunity. Criminal laws to punish hate crimes do not appear to be systematically applied and bias motivations figure in prosecutions only in a fraction of such cases. Although prosecutions for the most serious crimes have increased in number, racist assaults are still often prosecuted as acts of hooliganism and many violent attacks causing injury fall outside of the criminal justice system altogether. Separate laws on combating extremism define extremism broadly, but have not been used effectively to counter the many extreme nationalist or neo-Nazi groups that openly espouse and engage in racist violence. Anti-extremism laws have, in contrast, been misused to target human rights advocates critical of the government who speak out against intolerance. No official statistics on the incidence of hate crimes and their prosecution are systematically collected and regularly reported. The continued absence of detailed and systematic monitoring and statistical reporting on hate crimes, including data distinguishing the groups targeted for violence, seriously limits the capacity of policy makers to understand the true nature of the problem and make corresponding policy decisions. It likewise hinders a better understanding of the weaknesses of the criminal justice system as concerns the prosecution of hate crimes. Nongovernmental organizations within Russia have somewhat compensated with their own collection of data on hate crimes. While they acknowledge that their coverage is limited in scope and no substitute for government collection and reporting, they coincide in reporting a steady increase in recent years in the level of discriminatory violence. Although several official bodies address the issue of hate crimes in some way, there is no specialized antidiscrimination body in Russia with a specific mandate to monitor and report on hate crimes. A result is an inadequate response by the Russian authorities to the growing problem of racist violence. Government officials have on occasion publicly spoken out against racist violence in general, and on individual cases of hate crimes, but with little apparent follow-through. Just as often, officials have sought to downplay the scale of the problem. Overall, the message coming from Russias civil society leaders is that the official reaction to hate-motivated crimes and what these crimes reveal about the plight of Russias minorities has been both intermittent and largely muted, falling far short of the visible, concrete, concerted action needed to combat racist violence and related hate crimes. A comprehensive approach to the problem of racist violence is sorely needed. President Putin should appoint a special commission with the mandate to undertake a comprehensive investigation of the problem of racist violence and related intolerance in Russia. Political leaders should react immediately in public statements to crimes of racist violence and other violent bias crimes. Russias criminal justice authorities should undertake to more systematically implement the laws in place dealing with hate crimes and should take steps to establish a system for the monitoring and collection of statistics on hate crimes and their prosecution and for the regular publication of this data. Finally, the Russian authorities should also provide a mandate and appropriate resources to an official antidiscrimination body, in line with Council of Europe recommendations, to drive the policy measures required in the longer-term to combat hate crimes. Details: New York: Human Rights First, 2006. 38p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed April, 15, 2012 at http://www.humanrightsfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/pdf/06623-discrim-Minorities-Under-Siege-Russia-web.pdf Year: 2006 Country: Russia URL: http://www.humanrightsfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/pdf/06623-discrim-Minorities-Under-Siege-Russia-web.pdf Shelf Number: 124964 Keywords: Crime PreventionHate Crimes (Russian Federation)Racist Crimes |