The number of ethnically motivated crimes rises 100 to 150 cases each year

Moscow, October 21st - But only two or three persons are sentenced. This announced Alexander Brod, director of the Moscow Bureau of Human Rights, on a press conference. According to investigations of Human Rights activists, There aren’t introduced more than 70 criminal cases on article 282 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (“Arousing of national, racial or religious enmity”) each year. Only ten of them come to court. Ethnically motivated crimes “are usually qualified as hooliganism“. In the opinion of the Human Rights activist, this causes in the lack of “qualified experts” in the law-enforcement agencies and in the non-existence of a “specialized institute, which would involve into its conclusion the radical literature, the ideology of neo-nazism”. “We are willing to make such a conclusion. If the courts and public prosecutors only were willing to resist this phenomenon”, noted Alexander Brod. Besides, he declared that since the recent past the Russian neo-nazists actively cooperate with foreign partners. And “Russia is used as a bridgehead for nationalist ideas” by skinheads from different countries, since they can “act here undisturbed”. According to the president of the foundation “Kholokot” Alla Gerber, there are at least 5,000 skinheads in the Russian capital only. In Russia there are more than 50,000. Furthermore the Russian society is “sick of xenophobia”, thinks Alla Gerber. More than 60% of the Russians agree with the slogan “Russia to the Russians!”

Contact:
Alexander Brod (Moscow Bureau of Human Rights), Phone: +7 (095) 207-39-13, 232-29-90, 956-76-15, e-mail: mucsj@rambler.ru