RIGHTS-RUSSIA: Security Sweep Hits Displaced People

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Sergei Blagov

MOSCOW, Sep 27 1999 (IPS) - While Russian Defence minister Igor Sergeyev said Monday that Chechnya will be bombed “until the very last bandit is liquidated,” Moscow security officials continue to carry out massive round-ups against suspected terrorists.

The tactic, a desperate attempt to prevent more terrorist attacks in the Russian capital, has been deemed discriminatory by human rights group and even some government officials.

The Moscow police has carried out a massive security sweep in the last two weeks, detaining more than 20,000 people. City authorities have justified the round-ups as a proper response to the bombings, which have claimed more than 200 lives so far.

The government said “Chechen terrorists” have instigated the attacks. No big wonder that the majority of the detained turned out to be dark-skinned people who look like natives of Chechnya, a rebellious territory in southern Russia.

“We should not target any particular ethnic group,” Vladimir Kalamanov, head of Russian Migration Service, told IPS. “Police actions like that are going to be extremely detrimental to Russia’s international prestige.”

The police action was sparked by Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov’s order to re-register the city’s “guests” from other former Soviet states. So far, some 70,000 people have been checked and 15,000 applications for residence were turned down.

Now the municipal authorities vow to expel all non-registered “guests” – at their expense.

The New York-based Human Rights Watch condemned the mass detention of non-Muscovites. “Let’s not confuse the legitimate need for extra security with collective punishment of all people with dark skin,” said Holly Cartner, executive director of the group’s Europe and Central Asia Division.

Moscow strictly enforces a registration policy. Even in normal times, police officers routinely stop individuals to check their documents; overwhelmingly, they are darker-skinned people, typical of the Caucasus region, known in Russian as “blacks.”

Law-enforcement officials typically conduct identity checks in public places, such as markets, buses and trains, but they also visit homes often in a violent mood.

The authorities are also using Soviet-era methods of public surveillance involving networks of “alert citizens.” Groups of tenants are now patrolling neighbourhoods in round-the-clock guard duty, and checking rented apartments for unwanted tenants.

“We are keen to keep away all strangers,” Rita, an “alert” activist, told IPS.

Furthermore, mayor Luzhkov has stated his refusal to implement a Constitutional Court decision of February 1998, abolishing the restrictive aspects of Russia’s residence registration system (propiska).

Human rights activists argue that Russia’s federal authorities have done nothing to force the Moscow city government to comply with the decision.

But Moscow authorities argue that without a registration system the Russian capital would be swamped with immigrants whom are regularly blamed for the city’s growing crime rate.

According to Moscow’s deputy police chief Nikolai Vildyayev, roughly a third of all crimes and a quarter of murders in Moscow are committed by non-Muscovites.

Critics say that well-financed terrorists would have no problem in buy the necessary documents, while refugees, displaced people and other innocent victims of the Soviet collapse are going to be harassed.

Whoever right – experts agree that Moscow is becoming the hub of the country’s refugee problem. Around 50,000 refugees and 200,000 illegal immigrants are living in Moscow, and each year the city authorities grant refugee status to between 600 and 800 people out of some 12,000 applicants.

Moscow authorities also plan to introduce new residence permits in November. The new documents will be valid for one year and will cost about 100 dollars.

The revenue from the new process is supposed to fund the deportation of unwanted and unregistered migrants, itself an illegal measure, because failure to register is punished only by fines ranging from 10 to 50 roubles (0.40 to two dollars).

Human rights activists say that the federal government has long turned a blind eye to Moscow’s violation of federal rules, effectively allowing the city to become a state within the state.

Furthermore, the Moscow city police discriminatory practices make rules appear as pretexts for abuse, including extortion and beatings.

“In the aftermath of the bombing it has obviously become tougher for us to live here,” Levon, a car-repair worker, told IPS. He is an ethnic Armenian who fled unrest in Trans-Caucasus region and settled in Moscow a few years ago.

Though Russian authorities blame Islamic militants for the recent bombings, the police is often targeting anyone with a darker skin – including Moslems like Chechens or Azeris and fellow Orthodox Christians from Armenia and Georgia.

“The police seem to believe that indiscriminate round-ups of ‘blacks’ will improve the security situation,” Andrei Babushkin, head of the Russian Committee for Civil Rights, told IPS. “It’s a shame for the city of Moscow.”

The irony is that now Russia must prepare itself to receive even more refugees from the volatile north Caucasus as a result of the air bombing campaign against presumed terrorist bases in Chechnya.

The Russian generals have already made it clear they are not excluding a land operation.

Between 1992 and 1998 some 5.5 million people, mainly ethnic Russians, moved to the Russian Federation from the former Soviet states, including 490,000 in 1998, according to the Russian State Statistics Committee.

During the same period some 1.8 million people left Russia, including 130,000 in 1998. There are some 700,000 illegal immigrants, according to Russian Migration Service.

After the disintegration of the former Soviet Union, some 287 million people lost their old citizenship, but not all of them got a new one.

According to the United Nations Refugees agency (UNHCR), 25 million ethnic Russians are currently living outside the Russian Federation.