Ethnic Cleansing in Russia
Great Russian Chauvinism is back, as Moscow tries to expel all "illegal" immigrants of "Caucasian nationality."
Russia scholar Paul Goble, formerly with the U.S. State Department, Voice of America, Radio Free Europe and the CIA, is currently director of research and publications at the Azerbaijan Diplomatic Academy. Earlier, he served as vice dean for the social sciences and humanities at Audentes University in Tallinn and a senior research associate at the EuroCollege of the University of Tartu in Estonia. He blogs at Windows on Eurasia.
An expert on Russia’s race issues, he recently reported the stunning statistic, revealed by the Russian radio network Echo of Moscow, that one in four residents of Moscow are illegal immigrants according to the chairman of the city’s legislative assembly Vladimir Platonov. At the same time, Platonov confessed to a total failure of his government to collect and manage data concerning this crisis, implying it could be even worse than he thinks. St. Petersburg, Goble says, has a problem that may be even worse.
The term “illegal immigrant” is a complex one where Moscow is concerned, because it can apply to people who have every legal right to be in Russia. Even though it violates the Russian constitution to do so, the capital city still maintains what Russians call a “propiska” system, meaning that you need the city’s written permission to move there even if you are a native-born Russian citizen. Russian law enforcement actually welcomes the violation of the registration requirement, much in the same way that credit card companies are delighted if you don’t pay your balance in full each month. This gives beat cops the chance to stop people on the street at random, card them, and demand bribes if there is no registration. These are the “illegals” that Platonov is talking about.
The city recently tried an amnesty program to draw them out of the shadows. It was a dismal failure. It seems local employers are delighted to help keep their illegal employees in the shadows, since their status induces them to accept minimal wages (in a country where the average wage paid to a legal worker is only $4/hour, you can imagine the results).
Predictably, since many of these “illegals” have swarthy complexions, this situation feeds into the problem of Russia’s infamous xenophobia and racism, which is very much a top-down affair. Back in 1993, for instance, as the war in Chechnya was blazing, Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov issued a directive to expel all persons of “Caucasian nationality” from the city. Pointing to another EOM broadcast, this time involving Dmitry Muratov, editor-in-chief of Russia’s firebrand newspaper Novaya Gazeta (the murdered journalist Anna Politkovskaya wrote for it), Goble notes that over the last three months Russian racists have killed 38 people and wounded 113 more, and they have advertised what they have done in order to scare some and recruit others.” Muratov says that an open “recruitment campaign for a fascist army” is underway in his country, and decries the total lack of intervention by Russia’s security forces. “Where is the FSB?” he plaintively wonders.
Muratov appeared on the EOM program to warn that aggressive efforts were now underway to intimidate journalists from reporting on the atrocities. Goble reports:
After his paper carried an article at the end of last month on skinhead attacks, its author, journalist Valery Shiryayev, received a series of threats. Listen, he was told, “you are a puppet,” working for other unspecified forces. “You do not deserve to live,” the hate messages continued. “Death to the kikes, glory to Russia. Russia for the Russians. Success to all who struggle. Zieg Heil!” Muratov said that his newspaper had reported all this to the authorities, including the FSB, which has primary responsibility for responding to such attacks.
It’s an incendiary situation. Russia’s white-skinned, Slavic population is an ailing one, with an average male lifespan below 60 (Russia is ranks outside the top 100 world nations in this category), and its dark-skinned population is rising. Pajamas Media has previously reported the demographic statistics on Russia’s “Islamic Bombski.”
In the radio interview, Muratov was asked why he did not flee the country and seek asylum in the West, as Kremlin reporter Yelena Tregubova has recently done, finding safe haven in Britain after an onslaught of Kremlin threats. He gave a one-word reply: “Impossible.” Goble concludes: “While Tregubova’s desire for asylum is completely understandable given the nature of the Putin regime, Muratov’s continuing effort to combat this rising tide of fascism in the Russian Federation is not only noble but calls out for the kind of support from the West that he and others like him often do not get.”
Truer words were never spoken. Pajamas Media has previously reported on the trials of youth activist Oleg Kozlovsky, illegally drafted into the Russian Army to silence his criticism of the Kremlin. But no sooner did Kozlovsky win his freedom than he was faced with a concerted effort to evict his organization from its headquarters and the mainstream media, of which only the Washington Post and Chicago Tribune reported on the conscription, have ignored his plight.
Kozlovsky was holding his meetings in a private apartment he rented for the purpose. What would it take to give him the ability to rent a real office suite in a secure building? A few thousand dollars a month? Would it require some Herculean sacrifice for Muratov to regularly appear on the op-ed pages of our major newspapers, and for them to report the news his reporters risk their lives to generate? He’s trying to launch an English-language website, but for that he needs a cadre of skilled translators. They’re hard to find in Russia and expensive, so right now the linguistic quality is poor. What would it cost us to provide them to him? A few thousand dollars more?
If we’re not prepared to shell out pocket change to support people who are risking it all to create a Russia that won’t threaten us, we should expect to see history repeat itself where Russia is concerned.
Kim Zigfeld is a New York City-based writer who blogs at the Pajamas Media Network blog Publius Pundit and publishes her own Russia specialty blog, La Russophobe. She also writes for Russia! magazine and is researching a book on the rise of dictatorship in Putin’s Russia.
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10 Comments
1. Misha Two Percent:Do you ever get the sense that these Freedom House and ex-CIA guys got stuck sometime in 1984 and never stopped? That they’re hooked on a gravey train from a bunch of old fart Russophobes?
Does anybody really think the continued disintegration of Russia along ethnic lines is in the West’s best interest, that there ought to be more Chechnyas? Does anybody think that if it weren’t for Putin, Russia today would be a happy liberal democracy?
This is the bizarre doublethink of the Kim Zigfeld’s of this world – on the one hand, we have to oppose whatever the revived Evil Empire does, but on the other hand, look at how pathetic Russia is and how it’s falling apart. Which is it? And why is there not one iota of compassion for the Russian people, just Phariseeical condemnation dressed up as self-righteousness. After all, KZ has put in a good word for a lot of people – Saakashvili comes to mind – guilty of ballot box stuffing and sleaze, just so long as they “stand up to the Kremlin”. There was a genuine excuse for this when “he was our sunuvabitch” during the Cold War, but not anymore.
And no, you cannot say that Russia, like the USSR, is an economic pygmy but a militarily threatening giant – that’s gone. And the stuff portraying Ukraine and Belarus as victims of “energy imperialism” is nonsense – apparently they were entitled to cheap Russian gas indefinitely, simply because they sit between Russia and Europe.
At least Pajamas Media publishes Richard Fernandez to balance out some of the Russophobic insanity from whoever the heck KZ is. Tell me Kim, if we’re in a New Cold War with Russia, why the heck are the platforms for our sea based missile defense system being built in Vyborg, Russia? How about all those Russian Antonovs hauling bullets and MREs into Bagram and Basra? Oh yeah, doesn’t quite fit the narrative, does it?
As for “the Russians giving money to Hamas and Hezbollah” – show me exactly how this is taking place. Again, KZ just makes all kinds of idiotic and unsupported allegations, with not the slightest evidence to back them up. But at least fewer and fewer people on this site are taking her so seriously, whatever their views of Putin.
Apr 6, 2008 - 8:40 pm 2. Kim Zigfeld:MISHA:
I think you’ve not read this piece quite carefully enough. Goble is reporting information aired on a Russian source, Echo of Moscow Radio, by Russians themselves. His source isn’t Freedom House or the CIA, and has nothing whatsoever to do with them. Understanding that, the whole point of your comment falls apart.
This post, moreover, has nothing to do with the cold war, and your attempt to change the subject clearly indicates that you know your argument in regard to the actual topic is a surefire loser.
If you are suggesting Russia doesn’t have a serious problem with racism, you’re very disturbing detached from reality, and certainly offer no evidence of any kind to substantiate such a position.
Apr 7, 2008 - 4:29 pm 3. FP:Why is “Russia for Russians”[read slavs] bad again?
If you don’t like [russian policies] don’t go there. The “media” does not have a right to claim every country; you should be deported.
>
>Do you ever get the sense that [some are] stuck sometime in 1984…? That they’re hooked on a gravey train from a bunch of old fart >Russophobes?
>
Yes.
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Apr 7, 2008 - 10:05 pm 4. Kim Zigfeld:The american “right” is so littered with ‘cross purposes’ agendas, through hijacking, it is useless as a “right”. It is actually dangerous to any vestigial right.
FP:
Do you, then support the motto: “Estonia for Estonians”? Do you feel that ethnic Russians living in Estonia should go back home to Russia if they don’t like the way Estonia treats them?
Some people might argue that Russia shouldn’t isolate itself from the world by proudly proclaiming racism, but rather should work towards cooperation. The last time Russia decided to alienate the entire world and go its own way, it ended rather badly.
Other might argue that racism is simply immoral.
Apr 8, 2008 - 1:31 am 5. FP:>Do you [believe]…: “Estonia for Estonians”? Do you feel that ethnic Russians living in Estonia should go
>back home to Russia…?
Yes!
(BTW I don’t know what “race” “estonians” are (some kind of caucasoids from the mountians there; presumably non ‘Indo Euro’). And I don’t care. I’m Scottish from New Jersey.)
Here’s the deal…
People are inherently zenophobic (’race’ being one trigger for that bio impulse). The squatting citizens of a region (otherwise termed a race) are not simply more immoral [read zenophobic] than the type migrating to them. This is an important point which you types leave out –The minority is just as likely to “oppress” bigotedly if they become the majority in their new found “homeland”.
(Hell, I just saw on the tube –regarding that recent raid on the mormons in Texas– an ADA from san fransico make a skin crawl gesture and say “[but it's so alien an odd, their lifestyle]“, in response to someone saying “it is unconstitutional to raid like that”. Aint that rich…)
Until there are _real_ solutions to “balkinization” (part of the many faceted “human condition”, which is a poetic human conceit really meaning the ignored though persistent natural reality of the obstinate cosmos), there is no reason for a breed to allow/advocate its own marginalization in the grand darwinist scheme of things.
Given the cold hard facts of reality –especially as regards the effortless cruelty of children and females– if one becomes the ugly duckling in his _own home pond_ he’s done…
Unless one’s a diaspersing traveler.
Therein lies our irreconcilable difference. I’m no good at that and therefore I don’t advocate a clime of ever shifting homelands and economic exploitation of host population knaves.
Those that do, often say “but so called economic exploitation leads to ‘growth’ and that makes things better for those ex-knaves of the host population”. To which I say “better is relative” and it is also a convenient arrangment of data… Eg it is indeed better to have a tooth brush that spins @ 3000 rpms (I guess) but it is NOT better to have females run amok and cheat and lie etc with impunity (which is the other side of ‘growth’). But that not-better part there is left out of the data package used to evidence the betterment that is ‘growth’ (or it is perversly spun into some kind of positive and then craftily force fed to the host population knaves).
Ya dig honey. (As if… )
Apr 8, 2008 - 9:06 am 6. Kim Zigfeld:FP:
So I presume then that you have openly criticized Vladimir Putin for instructing Russians in Estonia to remain in the country and demand equal treatment with native Estonians? If that is so, can you please link me to your comments? I’d love to read them!
As for me, I despise racism, and Russian nationalism is Slavic nationalism, fundamentally racist. I think being racist harms Russia greatly. I’m saddened to see that you appear to think otherwise.
Apr 8, 2008 - 2:41 pm 7. FP:It’s like you didn’t even read what I said above.
Try it again…
—
—
Until there are _real_ solutions to “balkinization” (part of the many faceted “human condition”, which is a poetic human
conceit really meaning the ignored though persistent natural reality of the obstinate cosmos), there is no reason for a breed
to allow/advocate its own marginalization in the grand darwinist scheme of things.
Given the cold hard facts of reality –especially as regards the effortless cruelty of children and females– if one becomes
the ugly duckling in his _own home pond_ he’s done…
—-
—-
Where’s that renowend verbal acuity sweety. It’s like you didn’t even read what I said.
Just saying you despise racism isn’t good enough. It doesn’t change anything. The majority will still become the minority and then will be marginalized by “racism” in their own homeland if they don’t fight back against migrating minorities. America has already overtly demonstratred this very nicely thankyou (first with the Indians and now with the white males).
I could just as easily say “I despise migration” (which has always led to “reverse rascim”). And I could continue easily by saying “It is _immoral_ to migrate to someone else’s homeland, ultimately stealing spoils from the host culture’s crib and blood, sweat and tears legacy.
Just using a political trick of denouncing the host culture’s reflex of self survival as immoral and something to be despised doesn’t address a single thing; it is simply a political trick (witting or otherwise) to lull the host population’s sheep into compliance.
Just saying you despise ‘racism’ [read you despise the success of some majority of host citizens somewhere who aren't letting your favorites reap spoils] doesn’t change anything deep.
As far as you asking me to prove I’m loyal to your cause, where are your links demonstrating that you openly despise ‘migrant power prejudiciously marginalizing host weakness’ [read: "racism"] when that marginalizing of host weakness benefits your interests? Any links where you “openly criticize” what Israel (a newly arrived migrant nation) does to the vestigial host culture there?… hmmm?
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Oh and civil ordinances about having to ask to move to over populated Moscow is not “racism”. It is a verbal trick you’re using in the story to get allies. Same with the ‘Estonia issue’ (which is political border stuff from recent baltic history not racism per se).
——-
I state again from my first post here:
“The american “right” is so littered with ‘cross purposes’ agendas, through hijacking, it is useless as a “right”. It is actually dangerous to any vestigial right.”
Apr 8, 2008 - 5:09 pm 8. Kim Zigfeld:Hmmm, so Estonians can’t boot out Russians but Russians can boot out whomever they like, and your comments are utterly devoid of any criticism of Russia’s regime, but that’s “right” and those who disagree with you are not only “wrong” but stupid. How convenient! I congratulate you on becoming a fully realized neo-Soviet man. I hope you enjoy yourself in the ashcan of history.
Apr 8, 2008 - 10:31 pm 9. Tom:I hope this post goes up, for some reason it wasn’t posted the first time!
Would it be too much to ask someone, anyone, out of charity, to please edit this poor immigrant’s terrible English? It makes PM look like a rinky-dink site. These sentences for example:
Kozlovsky was holding his meetings in an private apartment he rented for the purpose. What would it take to given him the ability to rent a real office suite in secure building?
It ruins the whole effect of her moral plea for this beleaguered Kozlovsky guy. It’s a good thing he doesn’t know how a plea on his behalf got turned into a Borat joke.
Apr 10, 2008 - 11:26 am 10. orknexus:I am fascinated by the phenomenon of Internet giving a public tribune for self-expression to every utterly unqualified ignorant fool in the Universe, and others, who mostly consider themselves to be serious people, coming together to discuss the presented BS as if it would be informed, respectable, well thought out and motivated specialist conclusion.
Wonderful…
Jan 7, 2009 - 11:32 pm