A Russian ultranationalist group has posted a video on its websites that appears to show the execution-style killing of two men from Central Asia and the Caucasus.
Two men are seen kneeling on the ground in a forest, their arms and legs tied up. A large flag with a Nazi swastika stands in the background.
"We've been arrested by the Russian National Socialists," one of the two men says.
A third man walks up to the captives and beheads one of them with a knife. The second captive is shot in the head and falls forward into a freshly dug grave.
Two masked men then raise their arms in a Nazi salute.
Killings Appear Real
This the content of a two-minute video posted on the Internet by a little-known Russian organization calling itself National Socialism/White Power.
The video identifies the two captives as "colonists from Tajikistan and Daghestan."
It appeared on the Internet on August 12 but has since been pulled from most websites.
This is not the first time a Russian hate-crime video has been posted on the Internet. But antiracism experts say that while most of the slayings shown on these videos appear to have been staged, the latest footage seems very genuine.
"This film is the not the first of its kind, there have been other similar ones, says Vladimir Pribylovsky, the head of the Panorama political think tank in Moscow. "While the other films were probably fabricated, it's hard to say with this one."
The video has caused an outcry among human-rights activists in Russia and drawn heated debate on Internet blogs.
The Interior Ministry has reportedly opened a probe into the video's content. The Prosecutor-General's Office has yet to comment on the case.
Shohin Samadov, a representative of the Russian-based organization Migration and Rights, believes prosecutors have no alternative but to launch a thorough investigation.
"This case involves a Tajik and a Russian citizen," Samadov says. "I think that even if they don't do anything for the Tajik citizen, they will try -- for the sake of the Russian citizen -- to bring [perpetrators] to justice. It has become a high-profile case. It is all over the Internet, and everyone in Moscow knows about it."
Officials Reluctant To Crack Down
Russian prosecutors say they opened a criminal investigation into the video's content.
But Svetlana Gannushkina, chairwoman of the Civic Assistance committee for refugees and forced migrants, tells RFE/RL's Russian Service that Russian authorities remain reluctant to crack down on racially motivated attacks.
"Every day, people tell us about similar cases," she says. "This is taking on massive proportions. And the stance of law-enforcement and judicial organs is clear -- for every such case, we have to fight to obtain a normal investigation and a sentence against [perpetrators]."
Russia has seen a surge in hate crimes in past years, most of which target people from Central Asia and the Caucasus.
According to Sova, a Russian group that monitors racially motivated crimes, 37 people have been killed so far this year in racist attacks -- a 22 percent increase over the same period last year.
Few perpetrators of hate crimes have been brought to justice, as prosecutors continue to charge most assailants with "hooliganism" -- a charge that carries relatively light sentences.
Copyright (c) 2007. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.
Comment and add to the story without registration, but keep the comments meaningful please. Links are not accepted.
Comments
#1 Ultra Nationalism in Russia
This is crazy, mad and sick. What is really bad is that the government is not doing enough or almost anything about these things in Russia. Then they expect investments and tourism to develope in Russia. The government must crack down on these animals that kill innocent people because of national belonging.