Union of Councils for Soviet Jews: Bigotry Monitor: Volume One, Number 17

News

Bigotry Monitor: Volume One, Number 17

(November 2, 2001)

Volume One, Number 17
Friday, November 2, 2001

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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BUSH TO LIFT LAST BARRIER TO TRADE WITH RUSSIA; QUID PRO QUO BEING DISCUSSED. President George Bush will soon propose that the Jackson-Vanik amendment to the trade act should no longer apply to Russia, and the White House has begun consultations with Capitol Hill and Jewish organizations on the assurances to be asked of Russia in return. Bush would like to make an announcement at the time of his summit meeting with President Vladimir Putin later this month. The amendment named after Sen. Henry Jackson (D-Wash.) and Rep. Charles Vanik (D-Ohio) conditioned low tariffs on Soviet imports and low-interest export-import credits to free emigration from the USSR. Enacted in 1974, the amendment was perhaps the first and probably the most effective human rights law launched by Congress. It gave hope to millions of Soviet citizens that the United States could force their government to alter their conditions of life. But infuriated Soviet leaders protested U.S. interference in their domestic affairs. In welcoming the current consultations in Washington, on October 27 Russia's Foreign Ministry still referred to the amendment as "notorious," characterizing it as "among the last anachronisms of the epoch of confrontation and mistrust." The Foreign Ministry told Itar-Tass that "the full and complete" elimination of this barrier "will be another graphic confirmation of positive changes in Russian-American cooperation and an indicator of the new nature of partnership relations between the two nations."

The idea of linking normalization of trade to free emigration from communist countries had its origins in discussions UCSJ activists held with Leningrad and Moscow refuseniks in the early 1970s, says Micah Naftalin, UCSJ's national director. It was adopted by some American Jewish organizations and endorsed by Sen. Henry Jackson (D-Wash.). Among those who first got on board were Senators Jacob Javits (R-N.Y.), Hubert Humphrey (D-Minn.), and Abraham Ribicoff (D-Conn.). In the House, Charles Vanik (D-Ohio) took the lead. While other groups benefited too, such as Vietnamese refugees and evangelical Christians, the amendment was primarily aimed at forcing the Soviet Union to allow the exodus of its Jews. President Richard Nixon and his national security adviser and later Secretary of State Henry Kissinger objected. Initially the Jewish establishment agreed with Kissinger that the linkage was too confrontational vis-a-vis the Soviet Union, Naftalin says, and the Israelis were slow to warm to the idea because it seemed to them that the linkage deflected their emphasis on emigration to Israel.

Since then, each June the President has reviewed the status of emigration from the Soviet Union and later its successor republics, each of which must submit recommendations if it wants an annual waiver of the restriction, or if the country is ready to try to "graduate" out of the application of the law. In the early 1990s UCSJ was among the Jewish organizations that supported Russia receiving an annual waiver. Business interests in the United States have lobbied, unsuccessfully, for the repeal of the amendment, as have President Boris Yeltsin and his successor Putin. At the very least, they sought Russia's "graduation" from the law. While the law applies free emigration as the only condition to low tariffs, during the Clinton Administration that narrow conditionality was broadened to include other human rights issues.

"Given this background, while our final decision is still pending, it has seemed to many of us that Russia's graduation is inevitable, and, under certain conditions, proper," Naftalin says. "The question remains: What assurances can we get for our and America's approval?"

Naftalin recalls that when UCSJ leaders were in Moscow last July, they sought guidance from Jewish activists and especially human rights partners, and decided to support President Bush's determination to "graduate" Russia, provided that Putin made a number of moves. One, take some concrete steps, beyond earlier and welcome rhetoric, to combat antisemitism and other forms of religious persecution, particularly in the regions. (Prosecuting perpetrators of antisemitic hate crimes and publishing under Article 282 of the Criminal Code and reforming the discriminatory religion law would be examples.) Two, take steps toward publicly embracing the independent human rights NGOs, especially the Moscow Helsinki Group and Memorial. Three, demonstrate his personal support of the Russian Federation Human Rights Ombudsman, Oleg Mironov and accept his proposal for appointing regional human rights ombudsmen. Four, have Putin and the Bush administration tie government and business investment in Russia to concrete efforts to reform Russia's civil society.

"We came to the conclusion that this is the time to address the issue because we sensed that Putin's spring offensive to court the Russian Jewish community was a signal that he wanted to move closer to America," Naftalin continued. "In late summer, we were validated when Secretary of Commerce Paul O'Neill wrote an op-ed article in the 'Washington Post' announcing that he had brought a high level Administration team together with business leaders to reinvigorate business relationships with Russia. This signaled renewed Administration interest in Jackson-Vanik. Then, on September 11, Putin had his epiphany, reversing his Eurasianist policies and joining the anti-terrorist camp - this following an earlier meeting with Bush, who announced that they were soul mates." Naftalin believes that Jackson-Vanik, perhaps America's finest hour in the battle for human rights, has had its day, and Putin deserves credit not only for his pro-Jewish rhetoric but for joining the coalition against terrorism. "But regional antisemitism and hostility to human rights remain strong in Russia and his tilt toward America in foreign policy runs counter to the Soviet mentality of many high-powered politicians in his ministries and the Duma, who may seek revenge on domestic issues," he adds. "We hope President Bush will take the time to work out mutually constructive reforms before implementing his decision."

"The feeling is widespread in the Jewish community that now is an appropriate time to 'graduate' Russia," says Jess Hordes, Washington director of the Anti-Defamation League. "But we should seek reassurances from Russia to underscore its commitments to unfettered emigration, to respecting minority rights, and to complying with their own laws." Hordes would like to see written commitments from the Russians, perhaps in the form of an exchange of letters.

However, influential members of Congress are opposed to lifting the barriers now. In a letter to Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage dated October 30, Rep. Benjamin Gilman (R-N.Y.) called for retaining the amendment. As chairman of the Subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia, the veteran congressman wrote that he recognized the importance of the struggle against terrorism. But he protested that "many of the goals we sought during the Cold War have not been completely achieved, particularly regarding human rights and the protection of national minorities." He noted that in weighing "graduation," Congress is concerned with assuring fundamental human rights that "include free emigration; progress toward democratic rule and free market institutions; observance of the Helsinki Final Act and OSCE commitments regarding national and religious minorities; actions against incitement to racial, national or religious discrimination, including antisemitism; and the return of communal properties (such as churches and synagogues) confiscated during the Soviet period." He praised the amendment as "more than an instrument of Cold War diplomacy. It is a means to achieve guarantees for religious freedom and other democratic principles in a region where such principles are not deeply rooted."

RUSSIAN LAWS INADEQUATE TO DEAL WITH NEO-NAZI DANGER. Neither existing laws nor current draft legislation on political extremism is sufficient to deal with the neo-Nazi skinhead threat in Russia, wrote the government newspaper "Rossiyskaya Gazeta" on October 27. "The fines these laws impose are too small to be taken seriously," the daily added, "and as a result the extremists are likely to continue to flaunt their ugly views in public." The article used a powerful image to bring home its point about the neo-Nazi danger: In Volgograd, skinheads choose the Mamaev Kurgan - the hill that symbolizes the Battle of Stalingrad - to burn in public "writings of Baptists, Jehovahists, and theologians of Jewish origin." (The last reference may be to liberal Orthodox priests such as the late Father Men.)

STATE DUMA DEPUTY BLAMES JEWS FOR SEPTEMBER 11 ATTACKS. In a press conference held in the State Duma building on October 24, Viktor Cherepkov (Primorsky Kray) blamed a "Jewish-Masonic conspiracy" for the September 11 attacks on the United States, according to the daily "Kommersant." The former mayor of Vladivostok accused Israel of using "the world system of Masonry" to organize the September 11 attacks in order to give "at the sunset of the career of Ariel Sharon his old dream: Israel from the Nile to the Euphrates." He also blamed the recent assassination of Tourism Minister Rehavam Ze'evi by Palestinian terrorists on the same conspiracy. Cherepkov's proof was that only the Israeli special services could have entered such a well-guarded Tel Aviv hotel. He was joined by two other MPs - all three of them had just returned from a trip to the Palestinian Authority - in sending an appeal to the State Duma to prevent Russian citizens with Israeli citizenship from "taking up arms against Palestinians."

TWO RADICAL LEFTIST SPLINTER PARTIES UNITE. On October 27, 220 delegates from 56 regions of the Russian Federation met in Moscow in a congress designed to unite two splinter Communist groups, the antisemitic radical-left Russian Communist Workers Party and the Revolutionary Party of Communists, Interfax reported. Led by co-chairmen Viktor Tyulkin and Anatoly Kryuchkov, the new party's program specifies that, "without revolutionary actions of the workers and their allies, the toilers will not be able to take power into their own hands." RKRP-RPH claims a membership of "not less than 10,000." On October 29, "Kommersant-Daily" reported that Gennady Zyuganov, the head of the mainstream Communist Party of the Russian Federation, told his comrades that the Islamist movements will succeed where the communists have failed and bring down Russia's current regime.

MOSCOW HUMAN RIGHTS ACTIVIST WARNS ABOUT ESPIONAGE TRIALS. Though Russia is no longer a country of politically motivated persecutions, society has been "very passive" about a current wave of espionage cases against environmentalists, scientists, and diplomats, as well as probes targeting small-time politicians and religious organizations, Valentin Gefter, head of the Human Rights Institute, told the "Moscow Times." Recalling Vladimir Putin's career as a KGB officer, Gefter said that Putin's decision to join the war on terrorism could provide fertile ground for a wave of new repression. "Moscow Times" noted that two trials resumed this week: Arms-control researcher Igor Sutyagin, who has been in jail since October 1999, is accused of spying for a London-based company allegedly linked to the U.S. intelligence and Valentin Danilov, a Siberian physicist, is accused of spying for China. Gefter issued his warning on October 30, the day that was set aside about a decade ago to commemorate the victims of the gulag. The newspaper noted that as in previous years, several hundred Muscovites, mostly family members of the victims, gathered on Lubyanka Square, carrying photographs of their relatives. They lit candles and laid them along with flowers on the square's Solovetsky stone, a symbolic grave for those who vanished in Soviet times.

NOW IS TIME FOR HUMAN RIGHTS IN CHECHNYA, SAYS COUNCIL OF EUROPE LEADER. In an interview with "Ekho Moskvy" radio on October 30, Council of Europe's human rights commissioner Alvaro Gil-Robles said that the present is "a good time" to "strengthen our work on human rights observance and for peace" because "part of Chechen civic society has been reconstructed," "many people in Chechnya and Russia now really want the war to end," and "the refugees really do want to return home and reconstruct their land." He argued that "all bodies of administration, both local and federal," should start observing human rights. He said that "It is necessary for the legal system to work as it should, so that not a single crime, not a single violation goes unpunished." The interview began with the interviewer quoting the latest public opinion polls: 40 percent of Russians expect the situation to remain the same, 34 percent think that the crisis will become more acute, and only 12 percent believe things will calm down.

TATAR NATIONALISTS FACE CRIMINAL PROSECUTION. According to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, the prosecutor-general in Tatarstan is preparing to file charges of anti-constitutional activity against the organizers of the October 14 public mourning for the Tatars who died defending Kazan in 1552 against the Russian forces of Tsar Ivan the Terrible. (See Bigotry Monitor #15, October 19.) According to the prosecutor's press release, organizers such as the All-Tatar Public Center, People's Front, and Idel-Ural gave speeches and used slogans that "threatened the constitutional security and territorial wholeness of the Russian Federation." According to RFE/RL's Kazan bureau, some demonstrators called for the creation an Idel-Ural confederation, the rejection of Russian passports, and the transfer of law enforcement and military bodies to local authorities. Meanwhile, Rafis Kashapov, chairman of the moderate nationalist Tatar Public Center branch in Naberezhnye Chelny, told reporters on October 30 that some 70 people of various nationalities approached his group over the last month to join the Taliban and fight against the United States, Interfax-Eurasia reported.

MILOSEVIC MOCKS COURT; WILL FACE CHARGES OF GENOCIDE. Center stage once more, ex-dictator Slobodan Milosevic is back to his antics, comparing the international war crimes court in The Hague to a "retarded 7-year-old child" and charging that his trial has incited Albanian terrorists to "killing, plundering, burning, and doing everything as they did before." On October 30, he was forced to listen to a nearly four-hour-long recitation of the atrocities his troops committed in two wars, in Kosovo in 1999 and in Croatia in 1991. After each indictment, he refused to plead guilty or not guilty, and a panel of three judges entered on his behalf a plea of not guilty. Next week the prosecution plans to submit a third indictment, covering the war in Bosnia, where from 1992 to 1996 some 200,000 died, the highest death toll among the wars Milosevic is accused of whipping up. The prosecution says the charges will include genocide.

ROMANIAN MAYORS PLAN TO SEPARATE ROMANIES; PRIME MINISTER OBJECTS. Ion Rotaru, the mayor of Piatra Neamt, 215 miles northeast of the Romanian capital Bucharest, has proposed that 500 of the town's 2,000 Romanies (Gypsies) be moved into apartments to be built in a walled-in area that used to be a chicken farm. Romanies and human rights advocates protested. "This is segregation," Ciprian Necula, a spokesman for Romani Criss, a group that fights for Romani rights, told the Associated Press (AP) which also quoted Gheorghe Ivan, a government official who represents the Romani community. "I am afraid Hitler's ghost is still walking around the city hall of Piatra Neamt," Ivan said on October 10. Prime Minister Adrian Nastase condemned the plan, the newspaper "Adevarul" reported on October 15. "We cannot talk about a program for social integration of Roma in terms of ghettos," he was quoted as saying. "We have to be aware that we cannot solve our problems by hiding or separating them or by lifting all kind of barriers." According to AP, officials in other Romanian cities praised Rotaru's initiative and said they planned to start similar programs. Estimates of Romania's Romani population range from 1.5 million - AP's estimate - to close to 3 million.

* * * QUOTE OF THE WEEK * * * "In the short term, tactically, the Taliban and [Osama] bin Laden are a common enemy," said on October 25 Sergei Rogov, director of Moscow's USA and Canada Studies Institute. "Union does not imply total agreement on all the issues. Think about Stalin and Roosevelt. A more unnatural alliance could hardly have been imagined and yet it proved to be highly effective in the war on a common enemy."

MUSCOVITES IGNORE PUZZLING NIGHT OF VIOLENCE.
Skinheads and Soccer Fans Attack Asians as well as Passersby

On the night of October 30 in Moscow, three apparently interrelated attacks by a mob of young skinheads, students from trade schools, and "soccer hooligans" numbering about 300 killed two dark-skinned traders - one from Armenia and another from India - and wounded scores of street merchants as well as passersby. One crowd of young people dressed in black wielded iron rods and chains against the mostly Caucasian merchants in the Tsaritsino street market. At about the same time a second group of about a hundred rioters indiscriminately attacked passengers on a metro train carriage, and a little later a third crowd beat up Afghan refugees who live in the ramshackle Sevastopol Hotel. Some police officials and eyewitnesses blamed political extremists, but others fixed the responsibility on angry fans, many of them teenagers, of local soccer clubs, especially Spartak. But perhaps the most puzzling part of the violence was that many eyewitnesses, including police officers, told the news media that the attackers were "acting in an organized manner," as if in accordance with some previously arranged plan. It is not clear, however, who might have directed the action. Though the police identified some of the rioters as members of the far-right Russian National Unity party, its founder Aleksandr Barkashov denied any party involvement in the events. Aleksandr Ivanov-Sukharevsky, leader of the extremist People's National Party, acknowledged that some of his "great many followers" might have participated. One police official quoted by "Komsomolskaya Pravda" noted the presence of "adult provocateurs" who spurred the young people to violence.

On November 1, the popular "Moskovskiy Komsomolets" commented: "This bloody massacre, which would have caused a major stir in any other European capital, did not particularly upset Muscovites. That's because nothing special happened. Racism in Moscow has become the norm." The newspaper recalled that similar incidents in France and Germany prompted leaders such as Francois Mitterrand and Helmut Kohl to lead anti-racist marches to demonstrate that "Fascism will not pass." The paper asked the question: "Can you imagine President Putin leading thousands of marchers along Tverskaya Ulitsa arm in arm with Moscow Mayor [Yuri] Luzhkov?"

According to "Komsomolskaya Pravda," "classic" skinheads first made their appearance in Russia in 1993, but by the end of the decade, they were succeeded by a new breed of violent "head-banger" skinheads, mostly from Moscow region and the capital's working class suburbs. Sociologists interviewed by the newspaper estimate that there are about 20,000 skinheads in Russia "who have united to maintain the purity of the nation" and can be found in all large towns. The paper concluded: "By and large it is they who carry out rampages at markets, beat up Asians in the street, smash the windows of suburban trains, and open Internet sites containing slogans such as 'Become a skinhead and kill at will.'"
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