SUMMARY

By Vera Alperovich and Galina Kozhevnikova.

Edited by Alexander Verkhovsky

Autumn 2010 became a crucial phase in the development of the ultra-right movement. Various ethno-nationalist political groups held a series of organizational events which make it possible to speak of a gradual emergence from the protracted crisis and of a search (that was rather successful, from our point of view) for new strategies to get rid of the groups’ marginal statute. The ultra-right has demonstrated its determination to broaden its circle of allies, if not strategic then tactical ones, by abandoning crudely expressed ethno-nationalist slogans and moving to demands for universal democratic freedoms. Those were attempts to secure a place in the common oppositional field.

However, all other tendencies that we have been monitoring for the two last years persisted during the autumn.

First, there is no obvious growth of racially motivated violence, although it is increasingly clear that this is linked rather to the lack of the access to information rather than to a real decline of racist activity (above all, in the provinces).Read more...

Preliminary data for the year 2010 show that in 44 regions of Russia, racially motivated attacks resulted in the deaths of 37 people, with no fewer than 368 injured.

In December alone, racist and neo-Nazi violence resulted in the deaths of two people, and the injury of another 68. Compare to December 2009, when three were killed and 22 wounded.

The upsurge in violence in the final month of 2010 followed the events on Manezh Square and the attacks the next day in Moscow. Beyond the capital, violent incidents were reported in St. Petersburg, Krasnodar, Nizhny Novgorod, and Rostov-on-Don.

Moscow and the greater Moscow region continued to face the most violence, with 19 killed and 174 injured. In St. Petersburg and the Leningrad region, two were killed and 47 injured. In Nizhny Novgorod, 4 were killed and 17 injured. In Rostov-on-Don, 12 were injured in attacks, and in Tomsk, 13.

Central Asians continue to be the main targets of xenophobic violence in Russia – 16 were killed and 74 wounded in 2010.Read more...

Links between neo-Nazis and fans are growing as the country gears up for the 2018 World Cup

Behind a black door just steps from the golden domes of Novodevichy monastery, a group of young men and women sit huddled at computers. They are surrounded by racks of the red and white jumpers and scarves that mark the devoted fans of FC Spartak, Moscow's leading football club.

This is the headquarters of Fratria, the unofficial Spartak fan club that lost one of its members when he was killed during a brawl with a gang from the Caucasus, the restive mainly Muslim region on Russia's southernmost flank.

The shooting of Yegor Sviridov on 6 December has sparked the worst race riots Moscow has seen since the fall of the Soviet Union. The killing and beating of immigrants has increased, racist and anti-Semitic graffiti has proliferated, and the atmosphere is tense.Read more...