MINELRES: SOVA Center: Statistics of racist and neo-nazi crimes in Russia
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Sat Aug 25 10:42:07 2007
Original sender: SOVA Center <[email protected]>
News from the SOVA Center
03.08.2007
Statistics of racist and neo-nazi crimes in Russia -
http://xeno.sova-center.ru/6BA2468/6BB41EE/99ACB05
In the period of January 1 � July 31, 2007, in Russia, at least 310
people became victims of racist and neo-nazi crimes, 37 of them died.
Last year in the same period there were 252 victims, 21 of them dead. So
the number of victims has increased by 22% and the crimes have become
more violent.
Moscow, 24 murdered and 93 injured people, and St. Petersburg, 5
murdered and 63 injured, remain the major centers of racist violence.
Nizhny Novgorod, 34 injured people, where skinhead groups have started
to consolidate recently, is the third in this list.
We believe that we get to know about just a small part of hate crimes.
The majority of them remain underreported. Moreover, reports on hate
violence in the mass media have become really rare. More and more often
the SOVA Center gets the information directly from the witnesses of
these incidents.
Spring and summer 2007 have been marked by a drastic increase of attacks
against representatives of the youth antifascist movement and
subcultures. It is about 40% of all the crimes, while it was never more
than 30% before. We believe that this increase is rather due to the
underreporting of attacks against other vulnerable groups.
The state's attempts to prosecute hate crimes are essential, but,
however, they are too retarded. From January to July, 2007, there were
13 court decisions in connection with racist violence, acknowledging the
hate motive, and at least 3 decisions, which, by different reasons did
not acknowledge this motive. In total, there were at least 33 people
convicted.
Besides, ultra-rightwing propaganda has been more actively prosecuted.
In the reported period there were at least 16 verdicts concerning 17
people. The law enforcement has also improved considerably: there have
been less imprisonment sentences and more fines and banning of
journalist and publishing activities. We believe such kind of
prosecution more appropriate for the crimes connected with propaganda.
www.sova-center.ru
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