Volume 2, Number 17
Friday, May 3, 2002

BIGOTRY MONITOR
A Weekly Human Rights Newsletter on Antisemitism, Xenophobia, and Religious Persecution in the Former Communist World and Western Europe

EDITOR: CHARLES FENYVESI
(News and Editorial Policy within the sole discretion of the editor)

Published by UCSJ: Union of Councils for Jews in the Former Soviet Union
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UNEASY FIRST OF MAY IN EUROPE, AS PEOPLE SAY 'NO' TO FASCISM. Europeans feared violent confrontations between extremists in the course of the traditional celebration of May 1, the UN-recognized International Labor Day. According to police estimates, a record number of 1,300,000 people took to the streets of France (400,000 in Paris) to protest far-rightist Jean-Marie Le Pen's candidacy in next Sunday's presidential contest. Organizers called the march the climax of the daily "manifs" (short for manifestations) that erupted spontaneously nationwide on the night of April 21, after Le Pen's shocking second-place finish in the first round of the presidential election. "Say 'No' to Fascism" was the theme.

Le Pen's own May Day rally in Paris attracted up to 10,000 supporters - three times as many as last year -- including delegations from Italy, Belgium, and Poland, indicating his new status as the Number One far-right leader in Europe. Characteristically, he claimed an attendance of 100,000. He pledged that his "stewards" would keep out neo-Nazis, but reporters spotted more than just a sprinkling of skinheads, and police stopped at least one potential street fight. The far-right march culminated with the 73-year-old former paratrooper laying a wreath at the statue of Joan of Arc, the medieval heroine of his National Front as well as of France's Fascist party between the two world wars. More than 3,500 police kept the two main demonstrations apart and 330 surveillance cameras in strategic locations rolled nonstop. To the relief of most people, the day passed without a serious incident.

The difference in the size of the crowds and the implied assurance of a massive vote for Le Pen’s opponent, Jacques Chirac, did not seem to cheer the conservative incumbent. He stayed out of the streets, as did the defeated Socialist candidate Lionel Jospin, and both leaders repeatedly called for "calm." Chirac reminded the nation on radio: "In a democracy, political action doesn't take place in the streets. It takes place in the ballot box."

In Berlin, where the far right and the far left have often clashed in recent years, half a million people poured into the streets. One peaceful anti-Nazi demonstration turned violent after some 500 self-described anarchists lit a large fire on a main street and then attacked the fire brigade summoned to put out the flames.

On April 29, after a Molotov cocktail was thrown over the fence of a Berlin synagogue the night before, Germany's Central Council of Jews appealed to the government to combat a "spiral of violence against Jewish locations and people." According to the Associated Press, the attack, which caused no injuries or damage, followed a bombing at a Jewish cemetery and two assaults on Jews on the street. Police said they suspect as motives right-wing extremism and the Middle East conflict. They did not say "either or."

In "The Washington Post" of April 29, reporter Peter Finn profiled a Swiss convert to Islam, Ahmed Huber, 74, who identified his mission as building a bridge between radical Muslims and what he calls the New Right in Europe and the United States. September 11 brought the alliance together, said Huber, who himself was inspired by the attack to hang Osama bin Laden's picture next to Adolf Hitler's on the wall of his study in Bern. "How many of Germany's estimated 58,000 neo-Nazis are taking part in the alliance is unclear," Finn wrote, "to date there is no evidence that neo-Nazi violence against Muslim immigrants, a recurrent problem in Germany, has declined." The experts Finn interviewed were uncertain whether "traditional racists" may align themselves with Muslims but thought that "some of the leaders" see potential there. According to Huber who rides the neo-Nazi lecture circuit in Europe and the United States, aging SS officers who meet every few weeks in Bavaria for beer recently awarded the title "honorary Prussian" to bin Laden and praised his "valiant fight" against the United States. They now call him "Herr von Laden."

PRO-PUTIN RALLY UPSTAGES COMMUNISTS WHO PUT ON ANTISEMITIC SHOW. According to news agency reports from Moscow, pro-Kremlin parties and trade unions stole the show from the Communists by staging an estimated 140,000-strong rally on the Red Square - a turnout not seen since Soviet days. In a message read out to the well-organized, flower-waving crowd, President Vladimir Putin welcomed the show of strength by the unions and his key ally, the United Russia bloc.

The Communists, who held a rally near the monument to Karl Marx, attracted between 10,000 and 20,000. (The organizers claimed 100,000.) Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov called for the government's immediate resignation, which he identified as "the main slogan at the moment." Alexander Kuvaev, chairman of the party's Moscow city committee, suggested "preparing an appropriate reception to George W. Bush," as Bush is "an unwelcome guest here."

Despite a warning from Moscow police that slogans and actions that incite ethnic or religious hatred will not be tolerated, the post-Soviet May Day practice of distributing antisemitic literature and carrying antisemitic signs continued. According to UCSJ's Moscow Bureau Chief Aleksandr Brod, a very large number of vendors sold neo-Nazi books and newspapers from all over Russia. Booksellers lined up in two rows from Manezh Square to the Metropol Hotel, selling publications with titles such as "Kike-Masons," "Jewish Fascism in Russia," "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion," "The List of Hidden Jews," “Putin and His Team Who Are Devouring Russia," and "Mein Kampf." Some of the demonstrators carried portraits of Stalin and placards with slogans such as "Israel and the USA are the axis of evil," "No to Jewish fascism!" "Freedom to Palestine!" and "No to Jewish rule in Russia!"

Among those who addressed the crowd was the editor of the newspaper "Zavtra," Aleksandr Prokhanov. He shouted: "Today in our columns march Eduard Limonov, Yasir Arafat, and Slobodan Milosevic." He greeted “Palestinian brothers.” Komsomol leader Yaroslav Sidorov called for the audience to "step on the necks of the Abramoviches and the sons of Abraham," referring to the Russian Jewish businessman Roman Abramovich and to the Jewish people. The publicist Geydar Dzhemal condemned "Zionist hirelings and Israeli military rule" and ended his fiery speech by yelling "Allah akbar!" The crowd showed its appreciation with whistles and applause.

ANTI-IMMIGRANT SENTIMENT SPREADING IN RUSSIA. "The cities of Novy Urengoy and Magnitogorsk want to take a step back toward the closed city system of Soviet times by slapping restrictions on migrants, who they say are contributing to crime and proving to be a social burden," according to a report in "The Moscow Times" on April 29. Founded as recently as 1973 in the far north Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Region, Novy Urengoy is a city of 100,000 that has earned the title as the country's natural gas capital. Last week, lawmakers in Novy Urengoy asked the State Duma and the Federation Council to create a special zone around the city that would keep migrants out. Known as the capital of Urals metallurgy, Magnitogorsk has a population of 400,000. Last week Magnitogorsk lawmakers and the mayor's office appealed to the Chelyabinsk governor and the regional legislative assembly to change the Urals city's status to that of a border zone. The appeals from the two cities came at roughly the same time and less than a year after the Siberian city of Norilsk introduced its own restrictions on migrants, the English-language daily noted. Officials in both cities assured the press that they do not intend to slam the door shut on out-of-towners. In Novy Urengoy, officials said the city had only one industry - natural gas - and needed "only specialists with a very narrow range of skills." In Magnitogorsk, the line is that the city is close to Kazakhstan and needs better border controls. In addition, "a transit route for drugs passes through our city," an official said, and "many illegal residents from Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Kazakhstan" look for work but fail to register themselves and pay no taxes.

COSSACKS THREATEN TO EXPEL CAUCASIAN MIGRANTS. Don Cossacks from the Rostov Region charge that non-Russian migrants are ousting them from their native land, according to Ren-TV on April 30.The program showed Viktor Vodolatsky, ataman of the Don Cossack host, saying to "an extraordinary meeting" of his followers: "Our children will not live here in 20 or 30 years. And if they do live here, then they will be slaves of these so-called national minorities." Nikolay Kozitsyn, ataman of a smaller, more radical local Cossack group of the same name, said: "At the moment the Slavic nationals here have nothing while our brothers who migrated here from the Caucasus because of wars and hot spots there have become rich." The television correspondent explained that the "brothers" Kozitsyn refers to are Chechens, Armenians, Georgians, and Meskhetian Turks who, Cossacks believe, became rich through such illegal activities as stealing and selling drugs. Kozitsyn urged that they go back to the lands they came from.

The Cossacks have in mind of returning to the "model of the year 1913," the correspondent said, and they want be recognized as a nation and demand that the authorities give them everything they were deprived of after 1917. "Adult men are playing their Cossack game," the correspondent continued. "The Don Cossack troops under the [Rostov] Region administration admit to their ranks every Slav national aged 18 to 45. The rules of the second Don Cossack host say that Cossacks can issue decrees and print their own money… Cossacks have set up their own patrols. Everything is properly organized -- patrol members receive a task, have specific zones of patrol, and put their signatures in a special book. They do this as a real job in order to show everyone, mainly Meskhetian Turks, that the Cossacks are a serious force."

RUSSIA'S MUSLIM EURASIAN PARTY TO SET UP ITS MILITIA. The so-called Russian Eurasian Party, which claims a membership of 35,000, will form its own militia to help the police and FSB defend minorities from extremists, Duma Deputy Abdul Niyazov announced in his opening speech at the second congress of the left-of-center party on April 29, according to Glasnost News Service. Serving as chairman of the political council of the party, which is in fact the Muslim branch of Aleksandr Dugin's Eurasian Party, Niyazov expressed support for a Soviet-style planned economy and urged the government to end the rule of the oligarchs and rely instead on small- and medium-size entrepreneurs. He called for a peaceful settlement of the Chechen war and the legalization of polygamy. The several hundred delegates reelected as their leader Niyazov, who last year publicly accused Israel's "special services" of organizing the September 11 terrorist attacks.

SKINHEADS ARRESTED FOR MAKING EXPLOSIVES. The Russian security agency FSB in the city of Voronezh has announced that it arrested a group of skinheads preparing an explosive device to carry out an act of terrorism, according to a report posted on the web site of the "Kommersant" newspaper on April 29. The skinheads allegedly experimented with explosives in areas outside the city, which led to an accidental explosion that injured one person. Voronezh FSB also announced the arrest of a skinhead who distributed leaflets last week with a picture of the foreign student who had been beaten to death by skinheads recently. The leaflets contained calls to drive out all Jews, Arabs, and Africans living in Voronezh. According to the web-based news agency Utro.ru, charges of inciting ethnic hatred have been brought against the skinhead under Article 282 of the Criminal Code.

ULYANOVSK JEWISH OFFICE ATTACKED. On Hitler’s birthday, April 20, a group of people attempted to break the windows of the Ulyanovsk Jewish community's office, according to a report received by UCSJ's Moscow Bureau Chief Aleksandr Brod. But the windows had strong shutters that closed tightly, causing the attackers to give up. After screaming "Kikes, get out of Russia!" the extremists painted antisemitic graffiti on the walls and left.

In Samara, a television station partly controlled by the regional government broadcast a 40-minute interview with a local neo-Nazi leader, Brod reported. Appearing on the television show "Two to One" broadcast on the RIO television channel, Viktor Guzhov, head of the local branch of the People's National Party and formerly head of the local branch of Russian National Unity, spent most of the interview "pouring filth on Jews and accusing them of every deadly sin," according to Brod.

ANTISEMITISM ON PUBLIC DISPLAY IN TAMBOV. On April 21, skinheads in the Russian city of Tambov distributed on the streets the locally produced antisemitic newspaper called "To Spite Our Enemies" and video cassettes of the Nazi propaganda film "Triumph of the Will," according to an April 23 report by the Regions.ru news agency. Most of the newspaper was taken up by a speech about "Zionist" conspiracies written by Nikolai Kondratenko, the former governor of Krasnodar Kray who currently represents that region in the upper house of the Russian parliament. The paper's editor, Aleksandr Arkhipov, is the head of the neo-fascist Russia Party as well as a former deputy on the Tambov city legislature. Unlike in previous years, local skinheads did not mark the Hitler anniversary by attacking a city market place where mostly Vietnamese traders work, perhaps because of warnings by the police.

JEWISH GRAVESTONES DESECRATED IN LITHUANIA. Vandals smeared swastikas on nearly all the Jewish gravestones in Kristijonas Donelaitis cemetery in the Lithuanian town of Siauliai on April 20, reported the local newspaper "Siauliu Krastas" on its front page. Members of the Siauliai Region Jewish Community believe that antisemites in the town marked Adolf Hitler's birthday with the desecration.

THOUSANDS MARK MUSSOLINI ANNIVERSARY. On April 28, between 4,000 and 5,000 Italian neo-Fascists, many of them wearing the black shirts of the movement, marked the anniversary of dictator Benito Mussolini's death in his birthplace, Predappio, according to the Italian news agency Ansa. Some 300 of their comrades gathered at Lake Como, where partisans caught and shot Il Duce in 1945. In Rome, municipal employees stripped Fascist posters plastered on walls throughout the city.

On May 2, "Ha'aretz" reported that Israel’s government has ended its policy of “no contact” with Gianfranco Fini, head of Italy's far-right National Alliance and Number Two in Silvio Berlusconi's rightist government. The reason, Israeli Foreign Ministry officials said, is that Fini has retracted his pro-Fascist statements of earlier years and expressed support for Israel. According to "Le Monde" of April 26, both Fini and Berlusconi have distanced themselves from France's Jean-Marie Le Pen. Israel's government has a policy of no contact with Le Pen, Austria's Jorg Haider, and other European far-right politicians.

* * * QUOTE OF THE WEEK * * * "Antisemitism is a stronger force in world affairs than it has been since it went into a remarkably brief eclipse after the liberation of the Nazi extermination camps in 1945," writes syndicated columnist George F. Will in "The Washington Post" on May 2. "The United Nations, supposedly an embodiment of lessons learned from the war that ended in 1945, is now the instrument for lending spurious legitimacy to the antisemites' war against the Jewish state founded by survivors of that war."

THE ORTHODOX CHURCH TURNS TO THE STATE FOR HELP AGAINST RIVAL FAITHS

1. Believers Join Hands Across Russia Against 'Expansionist' Catholic Church.
More than 50,000 people have taken part in the All-Russia action in support of the Russian Orthodox Church, which was held in twenty regions of the country on April 28, chairman of the People's Party of the Russian Federation Gennady Raikov told a press conference in Moscow, according to Itar-Tass. He said the action was successful in Moscow and St.Petersburg; in Krasnodar and the Maritime Territories; in the Adygey and Komi republics; in Astrakhan, Irkutsk, and Omsk Regions; and in the cities of Tyumen and Chita. Participants protested the decision of the Roman Catholic Church to establish four of its dioceses in Russia, which they regard as disrespect for the "fundamental religious foundations of the Russian society and state, endangering the traditional Russian culture."

Fred Weir, "The Christian Science Monitor" correspondent in Moscow, compiled a series of citations explaining the reasons for the Orthodox protest. Perhaps the most telling is from Raikov: "The Russian state must show that it is not only able to defend the physical borders of the country, but also its spiritual values." Published on April 29, Weir's article begins by quoting Ivan Frolov, press secretary of the Union of Orthodox Citizens, a lay organization linked to the Orthodox Church, and one of the organizers of Sunday's demonstrations: "Our goal is to protect Russian statehood and our church against Catholic expansionism."

The reason is clear behind the recent expulsion of two Catholic leaders – one a Polish citizen, the other Italian. A third, a Russian monk, charges that Moscow police defaced his passport and threw it in the garbage after he identified himself as a Catholic during a street check of documents last week. "This pattern of events suggests the Russian government may be helping the Orthodox Church in its desire to eliminate competition on Russian territory," says Kamaludin Gadjiev, an expert on religion with the Institute of World Economy and International Relations in Moscow.

While the government has not issued an official statement, Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Yakovenko told journalists that in expelling Bishop Jerzy Mazur, the "competent organs" had acted in accordance with Russian law. "The basis for the relevant decision is serious complaints about the activities of the Vatican's senior representative" in Russia. Weir's own judgment follows: "Since the demise of the USSR, despite officially proclaimed secularism, church and state have drifted together." He backs it up with a statement from Alexander Kolunov, a professor of comparative religion at Moscow State University: "Since Russian civil society is so weak, the Orthodox Church looks to the state to provide material support and funding. In return, the church provides ideological legitimacy for the state and helps to bring up youth in the spirit of patriotism."

Weir's sources agree that the current tensions began in February, after the Vatican's decision to turn its "apostolic administrations" in Russia into formal Catholic dioceses. Explains Dmitry Shutko, identified as an expert with the official Institute of State and Law in Moscow: "The Russian state interfered because its sovereignty was infringed upon by this act. The Vatican established its territorial units and appointed its envoys without consultation with Russian canonical or governmental authorities."

Sergei Antonenko, religion editor of the conservative history journal "Rodina," praises the nationwide protest Sunday for defending Orthodoxy from "aggressive proselytizing by the Catholics" and suggests: "Because of the harsh Soviet experience, our people have not had time to rediscover their own faith." Weir concludes by citing experts who say "the real problem is that many Russians have simply not accepted the implications of post-Soviet laws mandating separation of church and state and full freedom of conscience." He adds a final quote from Kamaludin Gadjiev: "The Orthodox Church is demanding that the Russian state act in its old-fashioned role as defender of the faith."

2. Archpriest in Bishkek Calls for Countering 'Spiritual Terrorism' by the West.
A senior priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek has defended his diocese's attack on the proposed new religion law, Keston News Service reported on April 30. "We are not diplomats, and possibly we have spoken out too harshly," Archpriest Valentin, priest of Bishkek's Cathedral of the Resurrection, told Keston by telephone on April 27. "However, the essence of the appeal is absolutely correct. Why are Americans writing the draft for a new law on religion? It is intolerable that we should live according to the West's orders."

The diocese has appealed to Kyrgyz parliament not to adopt the law, which it says does not take special Central Asian circumstances into account. The diocese criticized the role of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), of which Kyrgyzstan is a member. An OSCE official told Keston that on two occasions, in March 2001 and in February this year, the Kyrgyz government asked the OSCE to provide analytical comments on the drafts. The second analysis welcomed "impressive" improvements over the first draft but made further recommendations for changes to bring the draft into line with international standards. The OSCE expressed concern that the bill implied that unregistered religious activity might be illegal and recommended that "the bill should eliminate all provisions that suggest the exercise of the rights of the freedom of religion and belief are contingent upon the state's registering of the organization."

Keston finds that the current draft law, which could be approved as early as this month, would enlarge the state's opportunities to control the life of believers. Its provisions include the compulsory registration of religious organizations, the requirement to license religious educational activity, and a ban on missionary activity that is not registered. Significantly, the law does not define the process for registration.

In a mid-April statement, the Russian Orthodox Central Asian diocese insisted that the bill was drafted by OSCE - which it called "the brain of the United States of America - that is trying to turn Kyrgyzstan under the guise of human rights into a religious rubbish dump and under the guise of democratic transformations into a pasture for missionary work." The diocese claimed that the weakening of state control over religious groups "is opening the sluice gates to sometimes reactionary confessions."

Archpriest Valentin believes that restrictions on "non-traditional religions" are necessary and charged that those living in Kyrgyzstan have already endured "plenty of trouble" from them. He said that preachers from the West are engaged in "spiritual terrorism, which is much more dangerous than Osama bin Laden's terrorism."
* * * *

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