Johnson's Russia List/A.P. - 04.20.2002

 

Johnson's Russia List

Russian: Prevent Racist Violence

By Angela Charlton

The Associated Press

MOSCOW  - While police fanned out across Russian cities Saturday to prevent racist violence on Hitler's birthday, the nation's top prosecutor admitted that authorities haven't done enough to stem ethnic attacks and punish the perpetrators.

 An Afghan interpreter was brutally slain by extremist youths last week, Russian skinheads recently announced a ``war on foreigners,'' and several embassies in Moscow - including that of the United States - have received threats of violence.

The heightened activity by the country's small ultranationalist minority has prompted accusations of police indifference by liberal lawmakers and Russian media.

 Prosecutor General Vladimir Ustinov, answering questions from readers of the daily newspaper Izvestia, conceded that not enough is being done to prevent racially motivated attacks.

``The police ... are clearly not doing their job properly,'' he said, in comments published in Saturday's edition. ``And the prosecutor general's office is not overseeing this question carefully enough.''

He insisted that cases of racist violence are routinely investigated, but added: ``It's another matter how thoroughly they are being investigated, how quickly measures are taken, how objectively the sentences are handed down.''

Amid mounting fears that extremists would commemorate Hitler's birthday by attacking minorities, the Interior Ministry boosted police patrols around the country starting Friday.

No violence was reported Saturday - the 113th anniversary of Hitler's birth - but Izvestia reported that 15 people were injured in a fight provoked by skinheads before a soccer match Friday in the city of Tula south of Moscow.

Across the Russian capital Saturday, teams of police stood guard at embassies, soccer stadiums and outdoor markets where dark-skinned people from ex-Soviet republics in Central Asia and the Caucasus Mountains often work as vendors.

But as they kept an eye out for extremists, the police continued the irregular practice of stopping people who look foreign to check for their registration documents.

Such document checks have prompted criticism by ethnic minorities, who say they are often harassed by police while lighter-skinned people - including skinheads - are ignored.

Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke out forcefully against racially motivated crime in his state of the nation address on Thursday.