Billboard for the referendum called to strengthen a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage and same-sex adoption in Slovakia in February. It says: WE ARE DECIDING ABOUT CHILDREN'S FUTURES. LET'S PROTECT THEIR RIGHT TO A MOTHER AND FATHER. Credit: Pavol Stracansky/IPS

By Pavol Stracansky
BRATISLAVA, Mar 15 2015 (IPS)

Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) groups in Central and Eastern Europe, which still faced mixed prospects as they fight for rights and acceptance, are now taking some heart from the “failure” of a referendum in Slovakia, a member of the European Union.

Last month, a referendum called to strengthen a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage and same-sex adoption in Slovakia was declared invalid after only just over 20 percent of voters turned out.

The controversial plebiscite was heavily criticised by international rights groups, which said it pandered to homophobic discrimination and was allowing human rights issues affecting a minority group to be decided by a popular majority vote.

The campaigning ahead of the vote had often been bitter and vitriolic, including public homophobic statements by clergy, and a controversial negative commercial about gay adoption, which Slovak TV stations refused to broadcast and eventually only appeared on internet.The reasons behind the relative societal intolerance towards LGBT groups in Central and Eastern Europe vary from entrenched conservative attitudes rooted in countries’ isolation under communism, to local political aims and the influence of the Catholic Church.

The commercial showed a child in an orphanage being told that his new parents were coming to collect him and, after two men appear at the door, asking: “Where’s Mum?”

Activists here say that the referendum’s outcome was a sign that, despite this campaigning, Slovaks know that LGBT people pose “no threat” to society and has positively furthered discussion about allowing registered partnerships in the country.

Martin Macko, head of the Bratislava-based LGBT rights group Inakost, told IPS: “The referendum showed that people consider the family important, but that they do not see same-sex families as a threat to traditional families. The long-term perspective regarding discussions on registered partnerships in Slovakia is positive.”

Importantly, the result has also been welcomed in other parts of Central and Eastern Europe where many LGBT groups still face intolerance and discrimination.

Evelyne Paradis, Executive Director of international LGBT rights group ILGA-Europe told IPS: “LGBT activists across Europe have welcomed the outcome of the Slovak vote … hopefully the referendum will lead to a constructive discussion about equality in Slovakia. At the same time, we know that there is a broad diversity of views in the region which means that much work remains to be done before full equality is realised.”

Compared with Western Europe, attitudes in many countries in Central and Eastern Europe to LGBT people and issues are often much more conservative and in some states actively hostile.

The Czech Republic, whose larger cities have relatively open and vibrant gay communities, is the only country in the region which allows for registered partnerships of same-sex couples.

In other countries, such as Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia and Poland, marriage is defined constitutionally as only between a man and a woman. In January this year, Macedonia’s parliament voted to adopt a similar clause in its constitution.

Adoption by same sex couples is banned in all states in the region while other important legislation relating to LGBT issues is also absent. In Bulgaria, for instance, inadequate legislation means that homophobic crimes are investigated and prosecuted as ‘hooliganism’. This, activists claim, creates a climate of fear for LGBT people.

Poor records on minority rights in general in places like, for instance, Ukraine, mean that while the state may ostensibly be committed to LGBT rights, such communities are in reality extremely vulnerable.

In Russia, legislation actively represses same-sex relationships, with federal laws criminalising promotion of any non-heterosexual lifestyle, while Lithuania has legal provisions banning the promotion of homosexuality.

Deeply negative attitudes towards homosexuals are widespread in some societies. A 2013 survey in Ukraine showed that two-thirds of people thought homosexuality was a perversion, while a study in the same year in Lithuania showed that 61 percent of LGBT people said they had suffered discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity.

Isolated verbal and physical attacks and passive intolerance among more conservative groups are common across the region. But in some countries, specifically Russia, anyone even suspected of being non-heterosexual faces open, organised and sometimes lethally violent persecution.

Natalia Tsymbalova, an LGBT rights activist from St Petersburg, was forced to flee Russia in September last year after receiving death threats. Now claiming asylum in Spain, she was one of at least 12 LGBT activists who left Russia last year.

Speaking from Madrid, she told IPS about the continuing repression of LGBT people in her home country.

She said that although state propaganda campaigns had “switched to ‘Ukrainian fascists’ and the West” being portrayed as the public’s greatest enemy instead of LGBT people since the annexation of Crimea and the start of the Ukraine conflict, “state homophobia has not disappeared”.

“It has just faded into the background,” she added, “no longer making top headlines in the news, but it is still there and it has never left. The number of hate crimes is not falling, and they are being investigated as badly as before.”

The reasons behind the relative societal intolerance towards LGBT groups in Central and Eastern Europe vary from entrenched conservative attitudes rooted in countries’ isolation under communism, to local political aims and the influence of the Catholic Church.

In Slovakia, a strongly Catholic country where the Church’s influence can be extremely strong in many communities, supporters of the referendum welcomed Pope Francis’ personal endorsement of their cause.

It has been speculated that the conservative Alliance for Family movement, which initiated the referendum, is funded by Slovakia’s Catholic Church and that the Church was the driving force behind moves to bring about the vote.

In Lithuania, another strongly Catholic country, Church officials have supported laws restricting LGBT rights and have openly called homosexuality a perversion.

However, some rights activists also say that politicians in countries struggling economically or looking to entrench their own power can often use minorities, including LGBT people, as easy political targets to gain voter support.

ILGA’s Paradis told IPS: “Unfortunately many political leaders use the LGBT community as scapegoats … from activists we often hear that they do this to hide ‘real problems’ in countries, such as youth unemployment, access to education and healthcare. They promote ‘traditional family values’ as the way to rescue society. Sadly, in doing this, political leaders build a climate of intolerance and hatred.”

Saying that Russian politicians are now using homophobia to push wider agendas, Tsymbalova told IPS: “Homophobia plays an important role in the anti-Western rhetoric of President [Vladimir] Putin and his fellows. It is one of the main points of the conservative values that they try to promote and the public still has negative attitudes toward LGBT communities.”

The outcome of the Slovak referendum has left activists there more optimistic about the future for LGBT people in their country.

They are now pushing for discussions with the government about introducing registered partnerships and they hope that LGBT communities in other countries in the region will be heartened by the result or that, at least, people hoping to organise similar referendums will reconsider what they are doing.

Macko of Inakost told IPS: “Religious groups in some Balkan and Baltic countries are considering organising similar referendums and we really hope this will discourage them.”

Paradis told IPS that while the Slovak referendum had already been welcomed by many of its member groups in Central and Eastern Europe, progress on LGBT issues in many countries, including registered partnerships, was unlikely to be swift. “There indeed is more discussion in the region on granting rights to same sex partnerships, but what we see is a very mixed picture.”

However, the outlook for LGBT people in some places remains grim. Tsymbalova told IPS that many LGBT people in her home country have given up hope of any positive changes in the foreseeable future.

“In our community, there is almost no one who believes that the situation for LGBT people in Russia will seriously change for the better any time soon. Under the existing regime, which promotes and exploits homophobia, these changes will not happen and there is almost no hope of a regime change, so expectations are gloomy.”

She added: “Many LGBT activists have either left Russia, like me, or are going to. [As] for same-sex registered partnerships, it would take several decades to be accepted in Russia and I don’t believe I will see this in my lifetime. It is completely out of the question for the next 20 or 30 years.”

Edited by Phil Harris    

Social worker in the flat of a drug addict in Donetsk doing outreach work. Drug addicts, like other marginalised groups, including Roma, are victims of the collapse of the health system in East Ukraine. Credit: Natalia Kravchuk/International HIV/AIDS Alliance Ukraine©

By Pavol Stracansky
KIEV, Jan 28 2015 (IPS)

With international organisations warning that East Ukraine is on the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe as its health system collapses, marginalised groups are among those facing the greatest struggle to access even basic health care in the war-torn region.

The conflict between pro-Russian separatists and Ukrainian forces has affected more than five million people, with 1.4 million classified by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and human rights bodies as “highly vulnerable” because of displacement, lack of income and a breakdown of essential services, including health care.

Fighting and accompanying measures imposed by both sides have led to medical supplies being severely interrupted or cut off entirely, hospitals destroyed or battling constant water and power cuts, and crippling staff shortages at health facilities as medical staff flee the fighting.

A complete lack of vaccines is threatening outbreaks of diseases such as polio and measles, while there are concerns for HIV/AIDS and TB sufferers as supplies of vital medicines dry up and disease monitoring becomes almost impossible.Fighting and accompanying measures imposed by both sides have led to medical supplies being severely interrupted or cut off entirely, hospitals destroyed or battling constant water and power cuts, and crippling staff shortages at health facilities as medical staff flee the fighting.

Massive internal displacement because of the conflict – latest U.N. estimates are of 700,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) with the figure rising by as much as 100,000 per week – has also left hundreds of thousands living in sometimes desperate and unhygienic conditions, creating a further health risk and the chance that infectious diseases, such as TB, will spread.

But while there is a threat to healthcare provision from collapsing resources, some in the region are facing extra barriers to accessing health care.

Ukraine has one of the worst HIV/AIDS epidemics in the world and the spread of the disease has been fuelled mainly by injection drug use. But, unlike in many Eastern European states, the country has been running for more than a decade an internationally lauded range of harm reduction programmes which have been credited with checking the disease’s spread.

These have included opioid substitution therapy (OST) programmes available to drug users across the country. These are particularly important in East Ukraine because the majority of Ukraine’s injection drug users come from the Luhansk and Donetsk regions.

But local and international organisations working with drug users say that addicts’ access to life-saving treatment in those areas has come under increasing pressure since the start of the conflict and that it could be cut off entirely within weeks as supplies of methadone and buprenorphine used in the treatment run out and cannot be replaced.

The International HIV/AIDS Alliance Ukraine which runs many OST centres as well as other harm reduction programmes, has said that stocks of antiretroviral drugs, OST and other life-saving treatments will have run out by  February.  More than 300 OST patients in Donetsk and Luhansk have lost access to treatment since the conflict began, while a further 550 patients on methadone will run out of drugs soon if emergency supplies cannot be delivered.

U.N. officials in close contact with international organisations helping drug users as well as doctors in Donetsk have confirmed to IPS that clinics have only a few weeks’ worth of stocks of methadone left.

One doctor in Donetsk working on an OST programme, who asked not to be named, told IPS:  “There are serious problems with medicine supplies. The last shipments came in September last year and some patients have already had to finish their treatments. Many had been on it for a decade and in that time had forged new lives, put their, sometimes criminal, past behind them and had families. It was absolutely tragic for them when they stopped.”

It is unclear what will happen to all those no longer able to access OST treatment. Doctors say some have gone into detoxification, while others have moved to other cities in safer areas of Ukraine in the hope of continuing OST.

But with 60 percent of those receiving OST also being HIV positive, according to the Donetsk doctor, and reports that many are now turning to illicit drugs and needle-sharing again as access to OST is cut off, there are concerns that the disease, along with Hepatitis C which is rife among injection drug users, and tuberculosis, could be spread, and that the lives of many drug users will again be at risk.

OST patient Andriy Klinemko, who was forced to flee Donetsk with his wife when their house was destroyed in bombing last summer and who is now in Dnipropetrovsk in central Ukraine, told IPS: “OST patients in East Ukraine are being forced to move, but not all of them can and even those that make it to other regions may not be able to continue OST because there is no money left to run such programmes. It’s a bad situation and at the moment I really can’t see any way it’s going to get better.”

But drug users are not the only marginalised community struggling to access health care.

Historically, the estimated 400,000-strong Roma community in Ukraine has, like Roma in many other Eastern European states, faced widespread discrimination in society, including in employment and education.

They have also always had limited access to healthcare because many Roma lack official ID documentation which makes it difficult for many to obtain official health care, while widespread poverty also means services and medicines which require any payment are also inaccessible to most. Meanwhile, many Roma settlements are in remote locations, far away from the nearest health centres.

Dr Dorit Nitzan, head of the WHO’s Ukraine Office, told IPS: “Even before the conflict, Roma in Ukraine had limited access to curative and preventive health service. As a result, Roma children have extremely low vaccination coverage. Moreover, rates of tuberculosis and other communicable and non-communicable diseases are higher among Roma than in the general population.”

Discrimination is also a problem. Zola Kondur of the Chiricli Roma rights group in Ukraine, told IPS: “In terms of healthcare, Roma are among the most vulnerable in the country. They are treated badly because of their ethnicity.”

However, the problems for Roma have dramatically worsened since the conflict began. Some human rights groups have said that since the separatist regimes took power in the region, Roma have faced systematic violent and sometimes fatal repression.

According to a report this month of an international mission to monitor human rights

by the Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, Roma living in separatist-controlled areas have been “subjected to open aggression from militants ….[who] have carried out real ethnic cleansing” against them. Many have fled and become IDPs, subsequently facing health struggles.

Dr Nitzan said: “As in every crisis, if not given special attention, marginalised and vulnerable groups are at higher risk. In Ukraine, many Roma lack civil documentation, and thus cannot be registered as internally displaced persons and are not included in the provision of any health services.

“Moreover, their inability to pay ‘out-of-pocket’ limits their ability to procure medication and/or services. Compounding this is that many Roma IDPs are residing at the margins of society, in remote geographical locations, where no services are available. All of these factors make health services inaccessible to Roma.”

Local rights groups say that Roma who have managed to flee to safe areas have often ended up homeless and starving after facing problems accessing aid because of a dismissive attitude from volunteers and staff at social institutions, while their lack of identification documents also prevented them from accessing any official help.

However, even those who have managed to find treatment have sometimes faced further problems.

Kondur told IPS: “In one case a Roma family moved from Kramatorsk to Kharkiv. A little boy had a heart problem brought on by the stress of the fighting and he was taken to hospital. One night, a group of young people broke the window of the boy’s hospital room, shouting ‘Gypsies get out’. The boy had a heart attack.”

Edited by Phil Harris

Young boy sitting on a wall outside 'Way Home', a UNICEF-assisted shelter providing food, accommodation, literacy trainings and HIV/AIDS-awareness lessons to street children in Odessa, Ukraine. Because of unsafe sex and injecting drug use, street adolescents are one of the groups most at risk of contracting HIV. Credit: UNICEF/G. Pirozzi

By Pavol Stracansky
KIEV, Dec 9 2014 (IPS)

Marginalised communities and civil society groups helping them are warning of a “tragedy” in Eastern Europe and Central Asia (EECA) as international funding for HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis (TB) programmes in the regions is cut back.

The EECA is home to the world’s only growing HIV/AIDS epidemic and is the single most-affected region by the spread of multi-drug resistant TB (MDR-TB). For years, HIV/AIDS and TB programmes in many of its countries have been heavily, or exclusively, reliant on funding from theGlobal Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria.

But this year has seen the Global Fund move to a new financing model based on national income statistics, under which funding in many EECA countries has already been – or will soon be – heavily cut.“This [reduction in Global Fund financing] could lead to tragedy because governments are not yet ready to take on the responsibility for addressing the HIV/AIDS epidemic. I would like decision-makers to understand that this is not just [about] epidemiological statistics but that our lives and health are at stake” – Viktoria Lintsova of the Eurasian Network of People Who Use Drugs (ENPUD)

Some of those likely to be most heavily affected by the cuts say that the reduction in Global Fund financing is putting essential HIV/AIDS and TB services, and with it lives, at risk.

Viktoria Lintsova of the Eurasian Network of People Who Use Drugs (ENPUD) told IPS: “This could lead to tragedy because governments are not yet ready to take on the responsibility for addressing the HIV/AIDS epidemic. I would like decision-makers to understand that this is not just [about] epidemiological statistics but that our lives and health are at stake.”

At the heart of their concerns are worries over funding for not just medical treatment for existing patients but prevention and other services for at risk and marginalised communities.

Injection drug use has been identified as the main driver of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the EECA but HIV/AIDS is also being increasingly spread among men who have sex with men and sex workers – groups which are heavily marginalised because of political and societal attitudes to homosexuality and women.

TB, an equally severe health problem in the EECA, is closely linked to the HIV/AIDS epidemic because co-infection rates are often high.

Throughout the region, prevention and harm reduction services for marginalised groups are provided by civil society groups which rely almost exclusively on international funding.

Sveta McGill, health advocacy officer at international advocacy NGO Results UK, told IPS that the withdrawal of Global Fund funding could see many sick people slip under the health care radar.

She said: “It is affecting services provided by NGOs covering at-risk groups. These ‘low threshold entry’ services, while not necessarily medical interventions, are crucial to keep people from risk groups coming to centres where they get referred to medical institutions to get treatment and can access medical services as well.

“Often, they would not feel comfortable going straight to state health care institutions, and closing down these venues would mean that less people would be referred to state health care institutions.”

Critics point to rising HIV/AIDS infections in Romania in recent years as a sign of what could happen in other EECA countries when the Global Fund cuts back its financing.

The Global Fund ended financing for programmes in the country in 2010. According to data from the Romanian government, since then there has been a dramatic rise in HIV infections among people who use drugs: in 2013, about 30 percent of new HIV cases were linked to injection drug use compared with just three percent in 2010.

Under the Global Fund’s New Financing Model (NFM), the major change is a reduction in financing to middle income countries. Many EECA countries are now classified as middle income and critics say that while the organisation’s goal of looking to prioritise use of finite resources is sensible, national income data does not always accurately reflect the ability of people to access health care services, nor whether a country has the funds for an adequate disease response.

They point to studies showing disease burdens shifting from low income countries to middle income states, and poverty being greatest in middle income countries. Also, most people living with HIV live in middle income countries.

But some have also dismissed as naive the notion that, as the Global Fund wants, national governments will automatically fill the gap in funding left as the Global Fund cuts back its financing.

Many point to the situation in Ukraine as an example highlighting the problems of the NFM.

According to a report from the Open Society Foundations, Global Fund spending on HIV will drop by more than 50 percent for Ukraine between 2014 and 2015. This includes reductions in unit cost spending for people who use drugs by 37 percent, for sex workers by 24 percent and for men who have sex with men by 50 percent.

Meanwhile, the national HIV prevention budget was slashed by 71 percent in 2014 amid political and economic upheaval.

Lintsova, who lives in central Ukraine, told IPS of the problems drug users are currently facing.

She said that not only are there shortages of the right drugs to treat TB in some parts of the country, but that very few drug users have access to them. Places on opiate substitution treatment (OST) programmes are very limited and waiting times to join them long, sometimes fatally so.

“I know two people who died waiting to get on an OST programme,” she told IPS. “And there are other problems like a lack of needle exchange centres in rural areas, in fact a lack of any harm reduction services in small towns, which leads to high rates of HIV in those places.”

She added that without proper funding, the situation would not improve. “The only solution to these problems is financing,” she said.

But other stakeholders have also privately raised fears that a greater government role in fields such as drug procurement could see authorities looking to save money and procuring larger quantities of cheaper TB drugs of worse quality. Meanwhile, local legislation also makes procurement tenders long and difficult, leading, some health care experts predict, to governments running out of stocks of some essential medicines.

It is unclear how governments will deal with the reduction of Global Fund financing. The transition from Global Fund to domestic funding, although widely announced and anticipated, is not going smoothly in all countries.

Many are often unclear when the Global Fund will actually leave because no straightforward timing plan has been set. There are also specific problems in individual states. In Ukraine, in particular, domestic TB funding has been severely affected by the military conflict, struggling economy and currency fluctuation.

Late last month, these growing fears prompted 24 prominent NGOs in the region to send an open letter to the Global Fund warning of their ‘grave concerns’ over the allocation of funding in the region and calling for it to work with local groups and affected communities.

They specifically asked it to look at each country individually, rather than adopt a “one size fits all” approach.

The Global Fund declined to respond when contacted by IPS.

However, drug users who spoke to IPS said there was little hope of an improvement in the region’s HIV/AIDS and TB epidemics if the Global Fund fails to heed NGOs’ warnings.

Lintsova told IPS: “A lack of reaction to our calls could lead to problems accessing prevention and treatment programmes and a deepening of the EECA’s HIV/AIDS and TB epidemics.”

(Edited by Phil Harris)

Immigrants in Russia could face a wave of violence following thousands of arrests in a crackdown on illegal immigration which has been condemned not only for human rights breaches but for entrenching a virulent negative public perception of migrants.

More than 7,000 people were arrested across Moscow – and more than 800 already served with deportation orders – under Operation Migrant 2014 which ran between Oct. 23 and Nov. 2 in the Russian capital.

The scale of the operation and methods used by the authorities has left international and local rights organisations outraged.

They say police used violence during raids on thousands of locations, including work places, markets, lodgings, hotels and people’s homes. They said that some migrants were forcibly taken from their families with no information given to relatives of where they were being taken.“Operations like this [Operation Migration 2014] only reinforce negative images of migrants in Russia and increase violence towards them. Once Russians see images of the raids in the news they will rally to support the government's actions” – Tolekan Ismailova, Vice-President of the International Federation for Human Rights

Some were deported without proper procedures being observed, according to local lawyers while others claim many of an estimated up to 100,000 migrants detained had money confiscated by police before being released without their detention being recorded.

Tolekan Ismailova, vice-president of the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), said: “This is simply an institutionalised way of intimidating migrants and their families. The operation violates Russia’s international obligations to respect human dignity and ban the practice of arbitrary detentions.”

But beyond the rights abuses, the highly-publicised raids are, critics argue, also helping foment and entrench a xenophobic attitude to migrants in wider society that increases the risk of violence against them.

Ismailova told IPS: “Operations like this only reinforce negative images of migrants in Russia and increase violence towards them. Once Russians see images of the raids in the news they will rally to support the government’s actions.”

The warnings come amid hardening attitudes towards what some Russian MPs estimate to be as many as 10 million migrants across Russia.

Since the fall of the Soviet Union, Russia’s large cities have been a magnet for migrants, mainly from former neighbouring Soviet states. Wages on offer in cities like St Petersburg and Moscow are often enough for immigrants to support entire families back at home. In some Central Asian countries, remittances sent home from workers in Russia account for as much as one-third of national GDP.

But successful assimilation of those migrants has been limited for a number of reasons. Migrants, especially those from Central Asia, have tended to interact within their own communities while support from Russian authorities and representatives of their own states has often been weak.

Rights groups say local employers routinely exploit migrants, refusing to give  them proper contracts, leaving them with no rights, often working in poor conditions and for low wages. Many are de facto working and residing illegally, and unable to access health care and pension systems.

Their situation also forces many to live in bad conditions and fuels criminality and violence in migrant communities, leading to further arrests and a perpetuation of negative attitudes towards migrants in wider society.

Ismailova told IPS: “Central Asian migrants are harassed because there is a culture of racism in Russia that perpetuates the stereotype that they are ‘black’ and they do the ‘black’ work in Russia. Many Russians have prejudices against Central Asians.”

Attitudes to migrants hardened in the wake of the financial crisis in 2008 and have worsened considerably since Vladimir Putin’s return to the presidency in 2012.

Critics say that the Kremlin is pursuing a xenophobic and anti-migrant policy in an attempt to distract Russians from wider problems in society.

They point to Operation Migrant 2014 as just the latest in a string of recent highly-visible crackdowns seemingly aimed at reinforcing the public perception of illegal immigrants posing a threat.

Operation Illegal 2014, similar to Operation Migrant 2014, was conducted in St Petersburg from Sep. 22 to Oct. 10, resulting in charges being brought against 437 migrants. And just last month, draft legislation was heard in parliament which would increase the penalties for foreigners exceeding maximum stay periods in the country.

Rights campaigners also point to other methods being used to fuel distrust of migrants, including authorities’ encouragement of citizens to report migrants they suspect of working illegally to a special hotline which passes the information to the police.

According to Ismailova, “this is exactly the same strategy that was used by the KGB. It creates a sense of distrust among people and is a major obstacle against securing human rights for migrants.”

The raids, arrests, anti-immigrant legislation and rhetoric from public officials – last month Moscow’s mayor said that were it not for illegal immigrants Moscow would be the safest city in the world – are little more than a “PR exercise” designed to deflect attention from other issues.

Tanya Lokshina, senior researcher at Human Rights Watch (HRW) in Moscow, told IPS: “With the ruble suffering an alarming drop, the government is apparently trying to divert people’s attention from concerns over living standards by turning their discontent towards migrants and, at the same time, demonstrating its own ‘effectiveness’  by attacking that ‘enemy’.”

Lokshina also said that “part of the problem with irregular migration is that employers don’t provide migrant workers with proper contracts. No one wants to work without a contract or permit – they do it because they have no other option. The government should ensure that migrant workers have contracts and relevant guarantees.”

Authorities have defended the need to tackle illegal immigration. They say that, among others,  illegal immigrants put a massive strain on state resources, particularly the health care system – migrants seeking medical help costs Moscow alone a reported 150 million dollars each year.

But rights campaigners say the government should be looking to strengthen migrants’ rights instead of enforcing repressive crackdowns.

They say authorities should give more notification to migrants to have residency and other documents in order before any raids are carried out and that a current three-month entry and exit visa regime for many migrants should be cancelled.

Even migration experts have openly questioned the policy of mass arrests.

Vyacheslav Postavnin, president of the Migration XXI Century foundation which cooperates with the Russian government working on migration policy, told Russian news agency TASS last week: “There are a lot of question marks around operations like this. I can see no quantitative value in them.

“Even if a thousand people were detained, there are thousands more that have not broken laws. The question is why were they arrested, taken away somewhere  and to some extent humiliated? What happens when it is found out that they are working legally?”

Others warn that the situation for immigrants is becoming increasingly fraught and there are serious concerns about the risk of violence against the immigrant community in the near future.

The Russian public holiday of Unity Day on Nov. 4 is often marked by massive nationalist and anti-migrant demonstrations in major cities and was last yearpreceded by violent riots in Moscow after an ethnic Azeri was alleged to have killed a Russian. Meanwhile, in St Petersburg, a migrant of Uzbek origin was killed during the national holiday.

When asked whether further violence against immigrants could be expected following the publicity around the arrests, Lokshina told IPS: “It’s certainly likely.”

(Edited by Phil Harris)

Irina was 21 when she first started using drugs. More than 30 years later, having lost her husband, her home and her business to drugs, she is still battling her addiction.

But, like almost all female drug addicts in this former Soviet state, she has faced a desperate struggle not only with her drug problem, but with accessing help in the face of institutionalised and systematic discrimination because of her gender.

“Georgia’s society is very male-dominated,” she told IPS. “And this is reflected in the attitudes to drugs. It’s as if it’s OK for men to use drugs but not women. For women, the stigma of drug use is massive. There are many women who do not join programmes helping them as they would rather not be seen there.”

Women make up 10 per cent of the estimated 40,000 drug users in Georgia, according to research by local NGOs working with drug users.“Georgia’s society is very male-dominated and this is reflected in the attitudes to drugs. It’s as if it’s OK for men to use drugs but not women. For women, the stigma of drug use is massive. There are many women who do not join programmes helping them as they would rather not be seen there” – Irina, now in her 50s, who has been taking drugs for 30 years

However, because of very strong gender stereotyping, women users have very low access to harm reduction services – only 4 percent of needle exchange programme clients are women and the figure is even less for methadone treatment.

Local activists say this startling discrepancy is down to the massive social stigma faced by women drug users.

Dasha Ocheret, Deputy Director for Advocacy at the Eurasian Harm Reduction Network (EHRN) told IPS: “In traditional societies, like Georgia’s, there is a much stronger negative attitude to women who use drugs than to men who use drugs. Women are supposed to be wives and mothers, not drug users.”

Many female addicts are scared to access needle exchanges or other harm reduction services because they fear their addiction will become known to their families or the police. Many have found themselves the victims of violence as their own families try to exert control over them once their drug use has been revealed. Others fear their drug use will be reported to the authorities by health workers.

Registered women drug users can have their children taken away while they routinely face violence – over 80 percent of women who use drugs in Georgia experience violence, according to the Georgian Harm Reduction Network– and extortion at the hands of police helping to enforce some of the world’s harshest drug laws. Possession of cannabis, for example, can result in an 11-year jail sentence.

Irina, who admits that she arranges anonymous attendance at an opioid substitution therapy (OST) programme so that as few people as possible can see her there, told IPS that she had herself been assaulted by a police officer and that police automatically viewed all female drug users as “criminals”.

But those who do want to access such services face further barriers because of their gender.

Free methadone substitution programmes in the country are extremely limited and because levels of financial autonomy among women in Georgia are low, other similar programmes are too expensive for many female addicts.

Discrimination is not uncommon among health service workers. Although some say that they have been treated by very sympathetic doctors, other female drug users have complained of abuse and denigration by medical staff and in some cases being denied health care because of their drug use.

Pregnant women are discouraged from accessing OST, despite it being shown to be safe in pregnancy and resulting in better health outcomes for both mother and child.

Eka Iakobishvili, EHRN’s Human Rights Programme Manager, told IPS: “Pregnant women don’t have access to certain services – they are strongly advised by doctors and health care workers to abort a baby rather than get methadone substitution treatment because they are told the treatment will harm the baby.”

While some may then undergo abortions, others will not, instead continuing dangerous drug use and the potential risk of contracting HIV/AIDS which could then be passed on to their child.

Meanwhile, those harm reduction services accessible by women are not gender-sensitive, according to campaigners, who say that female drug users need access to centres and programmes run and attended only by women.

Irina told IPS: “On some [harm reduction] programmes, the male drug users there will abuse the women drug users for taking drugs. This puts a lot of women off attending these programmes.”

She said that she had asked for a women-only service to be set up at the OST centre she attends but that it had been rejected on the grounds that only a few women were enrolled in it.

Together, these factors mean that many women are unable to access health services and continue dangerous drug-taking behaviour, sharing needles and injecting home-made drug cocktails made up of anything, including disinfectants and petrol mixed with over the counter medicines.

But there is hope that the situation may be about to change, at least to some degree, as local and international groups press to have the problem addressed.

At the end of July, CEDAW (UN Commission on Elimination of Discrimination against Women) released a set of recommendations for the Georgian government to ensure that women obtain proper access to harm reduction services after local NGOs submitted reports on the levels of discrimination they face.

These include, among others, specific calls for the government to carry out nationwide studies to establish the exact number of women who use drugs, including while pregnant, to help draw up a strategic plan to tackle the problem, and to provide gender-sensitive and evidence-based harm reduction services for women who use drugs.

The government has yet to react publicly to the recommendations but local campaigners have said they are speaking to government departments about them and are preparing to follow up with them on the recommendations.

Tea Kordzadze, Project Manager at the Georgian Harm Reduction Network in Tibilisi, told IPS: “We are hoping that at least some of the recommendations will be implemented.”

The Georgian government has been keen to show the country is ready to embrace Western values and bring its legislation and standards into line with European nations in recent years as it looks to create closer ties to the European Union. Rights activists say that this could come into play when the government considers the recommendations.

Iakobishvili said: “These are of course just recommendations and the government is not obliged at all to accept or implement any of them. But, having said that, Georgia does care what other countries and big international rights organisations like Amnesty International and so on say about the country.”

Irina told IPS that only outside pressure would bring any real change. “The European Union, the Council of Europe and other international bodies need to put pressure on the Georgian government to make sure that the recommendations don’t remain on paper only.”

But, she added, “in any case, the recommendations alone won’t be enough. The whole attitude in society to women drug users is very negative. It has to be changed.”

(Edited by Phil Harris)

LGBT flag map of Georgia. Credit: Wikipedia Commons

By Pavol Stracansky
TBILISI, Sep 8 2014 (IPS)

Georgia’s LGBT community is sceptical that recently-introduced anti-discrimination legislation hailed by some rights groups as a bold step forward for the former Soviet state will improve their lives any time soon.

The law, which came into effect in May this year, is ostensibly designed to provide protection for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people in a country where homophobia is deep-rooted at all levels of society and LGBT groups face daily discrimination.

But activists in Georgia say that introduction of the legislation has actually hardened attitudes against the LGBT community and that there are serious concerns over how effectively it can be applied.“Since the law was passed, things are actually worse now for LGBT people. When they make a complaint about something, people just say, ‘what more do you want? You’ve got your rights now in law’. It’s really obnoxious” – Irakli Vacharadze, head of Identoba, the Tbilisi-based rights organisation

Irakli Vacharadze, head of Identoba, the Tbilisi-based rights organisation, told IPS: “Since the law was passed, things are actually worse now for LGBT people. When they make a complaint about something, people just say, ‘what more do you want? You’ve got your rights now in law’. It’s really obnoxious.

“There are also questions over how it is going to be applied and at the moment, at least, it is definitely not effective.”

With a deeply religious society – 84 percent of the population identifies itself as Orthodox Christian – attitudes in Georgia to anything other than traditional heterosexual relationships are deeply negative among much of the population.

LGBT people say that they are often refused service by businesses and hospitals, bullied in school, and harassed by the police. Meanwhile, the Orthodox Church, which has a hugely influential role in society, has denounced LGBT equality and described support for LGBT rights as the “propaganda of sin”.

A 2013 survey by Identoba revealed how entrenched anti-LGBT sentiment is in society – 88 percent of respondents said homosexuality could “never be justified”.

A peaceful gay rights march marking International Day Against Homophobia last year ended in violence as protestors from a rival church-led counter-demonstration attacked and beat LGBT demonstrators.

But the country’s pursuit of closer ties with the European Union forced political parties, which had previously been at best apathetic towards the LGBT community, to address the issue.

As a condition of being granted coveted visa-free travel to EU countries, the government was told it had to implement anti-discrimination laws, including legislation specifically on gender expression and sexual orientation.

And although fiercely opposed by the Church, they were passed with the general support of all political parties.

However, LGBT people in Georgia remain far from convinced that, in its present form, it will help them. Although welcomed as a step forward, rights groups have criticised the fact that a devoted enforcement body was not approved and instead cases will go to the Ombudsman for Human Rights.

They say that the Ombudsman’s office lacks capacity and that effectively dealing with complaints will be compromised. They have called for the passage of additional measures to ensure enforcement of the law.

The Ombudsman’s office has yet to set up a department to deal with anti-discrimination complaints brought under the new legislation and one will not be functional before January.

Meanwhile, faith, or rather lack of it, in the country’s justice system is also likely to limit its effectiveness.

Viorel Ursu, Regional Manager of the Eurasia Programme at the Open Society Foundation, told IPS: “People do not trust the judiciary in general in Georgia. They feel that even when they bring legal action, there is no guarantee that justice will be served. And although there are laws designed to protect against discrimination of LGBT people, they will still face discrimination anyway.”

Activists are under no illusions about what the laws will bring the LGBT community. When asked whether he expected things to get better for LGBT people in Georgia in the near future, Vacharadze said: “Definitely not. There’s no chance.”

But the introduction of the legislation has already had at least one potentially positive effect. LGBT people say a profound ignorance of their gender expression and sexual orientation and their lifestyles contributes to the widespread antipathy towards them in Georgian society, but passage of the laws has at least promoted vitally-needed public discussion of the LGBT community.

Vacharadze told IPS: “The law alone will not change society’s attitudes towards LGBT people, it won’t get rid of homophobia. It won’t do anything to deal with the ignorance about LGBT issues and the community.

“The way to deal with it is to get information about LGBT out to the public and get them informed. One thing about the passage of this legislation was that it did actually create a debate about LGBT people in Georgia and got information about them out into the public and got people discussing it.”

The laws also have a wider significance in that they stand in stark contrast to the repression of LGBT communities in other former Soviet states, most notably Russia which is increasing its persecution of homosexuals through repressive legislation.

Just this week, the senior political figure in recently-annexed Crimea typified the Russian political stance to non-heterosexuals when he attacked LGBT people at a government meeting.

Sergei Aksyonov, leader of the new Russian region, said that if LGBT people held any meetings “police and self-defence forces will react immediately and in three minutes will explain to them what kind of sexual orientation they should stick to.”

He also said that “Crimean children should be brought up with a ‘positive attitude to family and traditional values’,” and that Crimea had “no need” for gays and lesbians.

Some observers say that the passing of the laws in Georgia, at a time when neighbours and other former Soviet states are attacking LGBT people, is proof that the country is set on moving closer to Europe and putting as much political distance between it and Russia, which has annexed some of its territory in recent years.

Indeed, as political parties debated the anti-discrimination laws, Davit Usupashvili, the parliamentary speaker, described the bill as a choice between Russia and the European Union.

Campaigners say that the government’s desire to cultivate closer and closer ties to the EU means that the legislation will, in time, become effective.

Ursu told IPS: “In the next year or so, the Georgian government should look to strengthen the law and try to prove that it is functioning simply because it remains under the scrutiny of the EU.

“The law not only had to be adopted but it also needed to be shown to be working effectively. It is in the government’s interest to ensure that it can be applied effectively.”

(Edited by Phil Harris)

Doctors are warning of a worsening tuberculosis epidemic in Eastern Ukraine as the continuing conflict there begins to take a heavy toll on public health.

With thousands of people fleeing the region every day, medical supplies severely disrupted and those left behind under growing physical stress and increasingly unable to access medical services, conditions are ripe for a rise in new TB cases.

Dr Masoud Dara, Tuberculosis Programme Manager at the World Health Organisation (WHO) Europe, told IPS: “The situation with TB was not good before the conflict, but we can say that the conflict has certainly made it worse.”Since the outbreak of hostilities and the Ukrainian military’s push to reclaim control of areas in Eastern Ukraine from pro-Russian separatists, health care providers in the region have come under increasing pressure

Since the outbreak of hostilities and the Ukrainian military’s push to reclaim control of areas in Eastern Ukraine from pro-Russian separatists, health care providers in the region have come under increasing pressure.

Not only have hospitals been forced to deal with treating of casualties of the fighting, they have also had to cope with patients being moved in and out of hospitals and abandoning or interrupting treatment as the security status of individual towns and cities changes.

It has also become increasingly difficult to obtain supplies of vital medicines, and terrified staff – up to 70 percent of medical staff are estimated to have fled Donetsk and Luhansk, according to U.N. officials – have left hospitals and clinics.

The problems have been particularly acute with regard to TB. Ukraine has one of the worst TB problems in Europe, second only to Russia in terms of infection numbers.

According to official data, there are 48,000 people registered with the disease and it claimed the lives of just over 6,000 people in 2013. However, one in four people with TB are not officially registered, according to WHO.

The country also has a particular problem with multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) which is much harder to successfully treat than normal TB.

WHO reports that Ukraine is one of “27 high multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) burden countries in the world,” adding that “despite the adoption of the Stop TB Strategy by the National TB Programme (NTP), its components have not been sufficiently implemented.”

Organisations working in the region say they fear the disease will claim lives as the fighting is making it impossible to identify cases, monitor or guarantee timely treatment for those who need it.

Dr Dara told IPS: “There are indications that incidence of TB may increase. TB sufferers need to have medicines provided to them in a timely fashion and if that cannot be done and TB sufferers’ treatment is interrupted and they cannot access treatment elsewhere, there is a risk that the disease could then be spread and that people may die.

“We do not have detailed information at the moment on how exactly the conflict has affected the TB situation in Eastern Ukraine, but we do know that it has, at least, affected TB control efforts. It is hard to thoroughly implement checks on all people with TB in the conflict zone.”

Doctors in Donetsk, a city of one million and regional stronghold for pro-Russian separatists, have told humanitarian organisations working in the region of their fears over the fate of patients needing treatment.

Ole Solvang of Human Rights Watch, who carried out detailed research in Eastern Ukraine on the effects of the current conflict on the region’s health care, told IPS: “One hospital administrator in the main hospital in Donetsk told us that his hospital had a capacity for 1,200 patients but that because of the war they had only 450 at the moment.”

Solvang said that “the explanations put forward for this are that because people were afraid of travelling they were not coming to the hospital, that they were saving money and did not want to pay to get to hospital or that so many people have left the region because of the conflict.”

But his fear was that people with medical problems not connected to the conflict, such as serious diseases, are now not getting the treatment that they need.

Other doctors have warned that problems with medicine supplies because of the conflict could turn out to be an even bigger problem than the interruption of TB treatment.

One who spoke to IPS said that if a TB patient was given only a few drugs instead of the full range of medicines needed as part of treatment, it could lead to developing the much more dangerous drug-resistant TB.

The true scale of the problem with TB in the region is impossible to ascertain clearly because of the rapidly changing conditions in the conflict zone, while many under-pressure medical staff working directly in the conflict zone have been reluctant to speak in detail to anyone other than colleagues.

Regional officials also declined to comment when approached by IPS.

One doctor from Donetsk who spoke to IPS said that TB patients in regional hospitals, as well as hundreds being treated on an out-patient basis, were receiving the treatment they needed.

According to Dr Yuriy Semionovich, “there are 550 tuberculosis patients in Donetsk and Slavyansk hospitals at the moment. They are getting all the medicines and treatment they need. There are 200 patients treated on an out-patient basis and they too are receiving what medicines they need. We have the situation under control.”

However, some others are far more pessimistic in their assessment of the TB threat to the region.

Natalia Chursina, deputy head of the Donetsk Regional Tuberculosis Hospital, told local media earlier this month that “we will definitely have an outbreak in prevalence of all forms of TB after all this ends”.

Despite claims from some Ukrainian officials that the separatists will soon be dealt with and that fighting could be over in a matter of weeks, many experts say a quick end to the conflict is unlikely. And even if that were to happen, it is unclear how quickly medical service provision would return to normal, nor how many TB patients may have abandoned or interrupted treatment.

What is clear though is that without a change in current conditions, the situation with TB in the region is unlikely to improve any time soon.

“If conditions improve with regard to the supply of treatment, medicines and provision of health care services then we can foresee some improvement with the TB situation,” Dr Dara told IPS. “But without a change in those, then there is little hope that TB treatment can improve.”

(Edited by Phil Harris)

When Veronika Sintsova was diagnosed with tuberculosis in 2009, she spent six months in hospital before being discharged and allowed to continue treatment as an outpatient.

Today clear of the disease, the 35-year-old former drug user from Kaliningrad says the fact that she beat tuberculosis (TB) is not because of, but rather in spite of, the way many people with tuberculosis are treated in Russia.

“I think it would be fair to say that Russian authorities don’t take the problem of tuberculosis seriously,” she told IPS.

Tuberculosis is a major health threat in Russia, where it is the leading infectious disease killer.The country has the highest rates of multi-drug resistant (MDR) and extremely drug resistant (XDR) tuberculosis in Europe and the third highest in the world. And those rates are climbing.Tuberculosis exploded in Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union as health care infrastructure crumbled, the country was thrown into economic crisis and crime and poverty soared, leading to overcrowded penal institutions.

It also has the 11th highest burden of all TB in the world, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO), which just last week said that parts of the country were “disaster areas” for the disease.

Tuberculosis exploded in Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union as health care infrastructure crumbled, the country was thrown into economic crisis and crime and poverty soared, leading to overcrowded penal institutions.

But, say NGOs in Russia and international groups working to combat the disease, the continued use of outdated and inefficient approaches to the disease are still fuelling its spread.

Long stays in health facilities filled with people with TB were a cornerstone of the Soviet health care system’s approach to the disease, and have remained, even though they were abandoned years ago in the West because they were seen as contributing to the spread of the disease.

But it is not just in health care facilities where people with TB are being failed. The disease is rife in Russian jails. Overcrowding, poor conditions and bad nutrition all contribute to high infection rates with one in seven prisoners having active TB, according to the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service.

The way prisoners with TB are treated typifies the general approach to the disease by authorities. Sintsova said that although she was treated well by doctors, it was during a sixth month spell in prison for a drug offence that she had what she says was “the worst experience” of all the time she had the disease because fellow inmates and wardens took no pity on her when she left her cell.

“They would shout out ‘tuberculosis sufferer on a walk’ as I went along. That really hurt me. It was probably the worst thing I experienced in all the time I had tuberculosis,” she told IPS.

And this abuse is typical, she said, of the way many people with the disease are viewed in Russia. TB is common among those at the margins of society – drug users, alcoholics, people with HIV and those in dire poverty. “In our society, a drug user is not a person and their death from tuberculosis is seen as something they deserve,” Sintsova, who herself has HIV, told IPS.

Third sector groups working with TB sufferers say approaches towards such people need to be changed. Anya Sarang, president of the Andrei Rylkov Foundation for Health and Social Justice, has previously told local media that the “unjustified imprisonment of Russian people, especially drug users, leads to prison overcrowding” which in turn fuels continued TB infection.

Others point to the need to provide integrated care for people with co-infections, such as HIV and hepatitis C. Oksana Ponomarenko, Russia country director for the U.S. organisation Partners in Health (PIH) which works with TB patients in Russia, said on the group’s website: “The biggest problem lies in the fact that each health system in Russia is vertical and operates separately –TB, drug addiction services, HIV care, psychiatric services, among other health programs.

“At federal level and in individual regions these programs are not connected. Often, clinicians in one programme will not have complete information on other nearby services and programmes.”

PIH and other local organisations have started programmes to try and provide integrated treatment to people with TB in some cities, including a mobile clinic.

Some success has been reported in a scheme in the city of Tomsk where prisoners with TB are all housed in one facility. If released before their treatment has finished, they are placed straight into hospital to prevent infecting others when they return to wider society.

PIH says that its methods have been adopted as official state policy on TB and legislation was recently brought in to emphasise the importance of ambulatory, rather than institutional, care in TB treatment. The government has also increased spending on TB in recent years, modernised diagnostic equipment and overhauled research institutes specialising in TB.

But what worries many working with TB patients is the Kremlin’s approach to some of the biggest international funders of TB projects. It recently decided to reject money from the Global Fund for Aids/TB and Malaria, justifying the move by saying that Russia is now a donor to the Global Fund and that it would be wrong for it to continue to take money from it.

Some see the move as entirely political and part of attempts by the Kremlin to crack down on foreign NGOs operating in Russia. Another major funder of groups working on TB programmes, USAID, was expelled from the country in 2012 and forced to stop operating, on the grounds that it was interfering in Russian politics.

Some projects, including a few run by PIH, have already been affected.

Nadezdha Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina (fourth and fifth from the right) with activists from the Andrei Rylkov Foundation for Health and Social Justice in Moscow marking the United Nations International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking with calls for reform of Russia's hard-line drug policies. Credit: Andrei Rylkov Foundation

By Pavol Stracansky
MOSCOW, Jun 26 2014 (IPS)

A protest in Moscow Thursday marking the U.N. International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking has highlighted the ‘torture’ drug users are put through in the Russian criminal justice system.

Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina, members of the Pussy Riot Group who were controversially jailed for performing in a Moscow cathedral in 2012, spoke in the Russian capital to highlight the plight of drug users in Russia.

Joining protestors in more than 80 cities around the world demanding drug policy reforms, they attacked what they said was their country’s “cruel and inhuman” treatment of drug users.

Describing a litany of rights abuses against drug users, including torture and beatings by police and prison warders, they said Russian authorities viewed imprisonment as a “cure for drug dependency”.“Similar to xenophobia and homophobia, narcophobia has become a protective cloak for the authorities .... Creating an image of the enemy, the subhuman, the zombie, and reinforcing that image in the public consciousness justifies the inhuman treatment of drug dependent people in our country” – Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina, members of the Pussy Riot punk rock group

“People who use drugs are outcasts – they are despised, hated, accused of all problems, and criminalised. Similar to xenophobia and homophobia, narcophobia has become a protective cloak for the authorities…. Creating an image of the enemy, the subhuman, the zombie, and reinforcing that image in the public consciousness justifies the inhuman treatment of drug dependent people in our country,” they said.

“Russia’s drug policy is built on torture. Humiliation and violation of human dignity – thisis what drug dependent people face everywhere, from hospitals to prisons and other state facilities,” they added.

Russia takes a hard-line approach to drug use, implementing repressive drugs legislation, including lengthy jail terms for possession of even tiny amounts of hard drugs.

Drug users say they are also targeted by police: official figures show that one in six of the Russian prison population is a drug user and, according to other surveys, just under 30 percent of drug users have been arrested at some point since they started using drugs.

They say they also regularly have confessions extracted from them or are coerced into helping officers as they go into withdrawal in detention – a charge police deny.

There is a complete lack of relevant medical services for drug users in temporary holding facilities and pre-trial detention centres and even painkillers are rarely given to addicts going into withdrawal.

Drug users in prison face particular hardship. Conditions for all prisoners are poor with hygiene often bad, cells massively overcrowded and brutality and disease rife. But drug users are especially vulnerable.

Anya Sarang, head of the Moscow-based Andrei Rylkov Foundation for Health and Social Justice, which works to raise awareness of drug problems, told IPS: “Russian prison is torture in itself with prisoners not given basic medical infection control, nutrition etc., and general human rights violations. But drug users are more vulnerable than other prisoners.

“For instance many are HIV positive, but not only are there problems getting their medicine or starting them on treatment because they are not given necessary immune system checks in some cases, but their diet is poor and there is always the risk of infections, such as tuberculosis.”

Tuberculosis (TB) is a major problem in Russian prisons, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO) and other bodies. Studies have shown that a person with HIV is 25 times more likely to contract TB in a Russian prison than outside one.

But the risk of potentially deadly infections is only one problem facing drug users in prisons. As in many jails across the world, drugs are smuggled in and traded between inmates, giving users, some of whom may never have tried hard drugs, access to substances like heroin and experience of dangerous drug-taking methods.

Campaigners say that this is further evidence of how the criminalisation of drug use only perpetuates and worsens drug problems.

Michel Kazatchkine, UN Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, told IPS: “We know from studies that contact with the criminal justice system is associated with increased injection drug use and other similar behaviour, among other problems. Putting drug users in prisons …. is making things worse not just in prisons but also for communities when they are released from prison.”

Activists point to how opioid substituition therapy (OST) for people in custody or prison has been successfully implemented in some Western states.

But the practice is completely banned in Russia, despite being widely implemented in many countries around the world, recommended by the World Health Organisation (WHO), and having been proved to be successful in helping halt the spread of HIV/AIDS.

Russia has one of the world’s fastest growing HIV/AIDS epidemics – there were 78,000 new HIV cases registered last year, up from 69,000 in 2012 and 62,000 in 2011 – which the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV and AIDS (UNAIDS) and other bodies say has been historically driven by injection drug use.

Drug use in the country is growing equally rapidly. According to figures from the country’s Federal Drug Control Service (FSKN) there were an estimated 8.5 million drug addicts in 2013 – up from 2.5 million since 2010. The service says up to 100,000 people die each year in Russia from drug abuse. It is also the world’s largest heroin consumer.

Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina said only a reform of drug policy including decriminalisation would improve the situation in prisons.

But Russian authorities show no sign of lifting the OST ban nor improving the very limited harm reduction services which exist in the country and FSKN officials have made a number of public statements in recent months reaffirming their commitment to hard-line drugs policies.

Kazatchine told IPS: “I don’t see any sign of Russia’s approach to drugs softening. What I am seeing is a toughening of the way Russian society looks at marginalised groups, such as drug users, men who have sex with men, LGBT people, etc. The climate has toughened and Russia is de facto criminalising drug use and recession.”

This, critics say, has left Russian drug users in a terrible position in society. Sergey Votyagov Executive Director of the Eurasian HRM Reduction Network (EHRN), told IPS that they were “one of the most stigmatised and under-served populations” in the country.

Meanwhile, the devastation wrought by Russia’s drugs policies has been seen clearly in its newest territory. Just days before Thursday’s protest in Moscow, campaigners in Ukraine had raised the alarm over the fate of drug users in Crimea following its recent annexation.

OST is available in Ukraine and had been provided to 800 people in Crimea. But as part of Russia, Moscow ordered OST programmes there shut down at the start of May.

A mission by the Council of Europe to Crimea which ended last month reported that at least 20 people had died following the cessation of the programmes and at least 50 more had migrated to the Ukrainian mainland, while a few had gone to Russia for detoxification and rehabilitation treatment.

Those who remained spoke of having to deal with intimidation by new authorities and, in some cases, losing their jobs because of either worsening health or their status as former OST patients being made public.

Some who have fled the peninsula described the fear and desperation among drug users still there.

Speaking at an event organised by the International HIV/AIDS Alliance in Ukraine in Kiev earlier this month, one woman, Oksana, who left the day after her OST treatment had stopped, said:  “I might have died if I had stayed in Crimea.

“I am disabled, I have had a stroke and I know very well how it feels to be left without therapy and help. Those who could not leave Crimea are in terrible conditions. Some of them are already dead, others have chosen suicide.”

There is little hope that things in Crimea will change any time in the foreseeable future. Earlier this month, Sergei Donich, deputy prime minister in the Crimean government, told local media that OST was ineffective and was being pushed by pharmaceutical firms who stood to gain from it.

Kazatchine described the situation on the peninsula as a “tragedy”, adding that it was unlikely there would not be more deaths among drug users.

He told IPS: “Evidence shows that OST reduces mortality, it prevents overdoses among drug users. I think it is inevitable that [with no more OST] more drug users will die.”

Climate change will cause the Siberian permafrost to thaw. Credit: Softpedia/Celsias

By Pavol Stracansky
MOSCOW, Jun 21 2014 (IPS)

People in Siberia must prepare to face frequent repeats of recent devastating floods as well as other natural disasters, scientists and ecologists are warning, amid growing evidence of the effects of global warming on one of the world’s most ecologically diverse regions.

More than 50,000 people were affected by floods in the Altai region and Khakassia and Altai republics in southern Siberia at the end of May and early June. These came just over half a year since the worst floods in Siberia in living memory.

But while floods caused by snowmelt are not uncommon to Siberia, these most recent ones were caused by excessive rainfall – a phenomenon global warming is expected to make much more frequent in future.As the world’s fourth largest greenhouse gas producer behind the United States, India and China, and with a fossil fuel-intensive economy which the government is desperate to boost, Russia has historically been far from the vanguard of global environmental policy reform.

Vladimir Galakhov, a physical geography professor at Altai University in Siberia, told IPS: “Although many people think the recent floods were caused by snow melting, it was actually intense rainfall. We had two months’ rain in one week. Weather models for the next two decades forecast a 10 percent rise in rainfall volumes, so we can expect more flooding in the future.”

Siberia is home to some of the richest diversity of flora and fauna in the world, including endangered species such as the Amur tiger. It is also one of the coldest places on earth, with average temperatures in most parts just under zero degrees Celsius and often much lower.

But scientific studies in the last decade have shown that parts of Siberia are warming more quickly than any other part of the world – something pointed out again in the wake of the floods by local meteorologists.

Professor Valentin Meleshko, a meteorologist and former head of the St Petersburg-based Voyeikov Geophysical Observatory, told Russian media last month after the flooding that rapid temperature rises were having a “significant” impact on Siberia.

“All forecasts from complex [weather and climate change forecast] models show that Siberia will get more precipitation, mostly in winter, when more snow will accumulate.

“It will naturally melt in spring and this melting snow will put more water into rivers, and the floods in Siberia will be more intense than before.”

But warming is not only expected to increase flooding. According to experts such as Alexei Kokorin, head of the WWF Russia climate division, it poses other serious threats.

He told IPS that the size of Siberia meant that different areas will be affected in different ways: east and south-east Siberia in the area of the Amur River will see more frequent heavy rains and a monsoon climate while southern Siberia near Mongolia will see increasing desertification leading to water supply problems and disappearing pastures to provide feeding grounds for animals.

Meanwhile, in northern Siberia, the melting of permafrost will destroy existing infrastructure. This also threatens to drastically worsen climate change as vast amounts of methane – a potent greenhouse gas – are trapped in the frozen ground and if released into the atmosphere in large amounts would accelerate global warming.

“Siberia will maybe not be the very worst affected area in the world by global warming, but some parts of it will be heavily affected,” Kokorin told IPS.

Ecological groups have been warning of these risks for years and appealing to Russian authorities to take action.

But the Russian political response to global warming has been characterised largely by apparent ambivalence.

As the world’s fourth largest greenhouse gas producer behind the United States, India and China, and with a fossil fuel-intensive economy which the government is desperate to boost, Russia has historically been far from the vanguard of global environmental policy reform.

But some experts believe that the general government ambivalence to climate change is driven by the fact that Russia potentially stands to be one of the biggest geopolitical gainers from climate change.

Although a highly resource-rich nation, vast reserves of fossil fuels in Russia are under either ice or frozen permafrost. Higher temperatures could make it easier to access these and other enormous quantities of valuable ores and minerals as well as changing huge areas of land from being uninhabitable to fit for agricultural production or other use.

Arctic ice melt driven by global warming is also expected to soon provide an almost year-round open sea passage north of the country which Russia could exploit, allowing tens of millions of tons more of goods to be transported annually.

Some officials have publicly said that they view global warming positively. In an interview last year, Rinat Gizatullin, an official at the Russian Natural Resources Ministry, told the BBC: “We are not panicking. Global warming is not as catastrophic for us as it might be for some other countries. If anything, we’ll be even better off.”

Against this backdrop, the Russian scientific community is divided on climate change. While some, including senior state meteorologists, have in the past spoken publically of the threat from climate change to Russia, others are more reticent on the issue and refuse to openly acknowledge global warming as a phenomenon.

Raisa Buzunova, a hydrometeorologist from Kemerovo in western Siberia, told IPS that while temperatures had been rising constantly for years in parts of Siberia, the result of which was now extended summers, this was not evidence of global warming.

She told IPS: “We are not talking about a sudden change in climate or global warming, but only periodic temperature fluctuations. A stabilisation of temperatures in Siberia is expected by 2020.”

Many others say that global warming has actually peaked and that world temperatures will actually begin falling in a few years and then stabilising.

However, local ecologists say that the evidence is irrefutable, pointing to events such as the record wildfire season in 2012 in Siberia amid an unusually warm summer, as well as the worst floods on record last autumn, an exceptionally mild winter just passed, as well as a record warm spring and the recent floods.

Mikhail Gunykin from the Moscow-based pan-Russian Ecodelo ecological network, told IPS: “In Russia, as in the rest of the world, what we have seen in recent years is increasingly frequent natural disasters as a result of the way humans treat ecosystems.”

As the Palestinian unity government announced June 2 receives a cautious welcome from many world leaders, Russia’s support for the new body is providing the Kremlin with an opportune platform to pursue its foreign policy ambitions and strengthen its domestic ideology.

Russia is one of the four members of the Middle East Quartet – along with the European Union, the United States and the United Nations – working on the Israeli-Palestine peace process and has pledged its, albeit cautious, support for the new body.

But with seven years of internal conflict having been brought to an end with the formation of the unity government, Russia is now likely to be looking to emphasise its role as peace broker in the Middle East to gain influence not just in the region, but in other areas torn by internal conflict, experts say.“Russia could use this unity government as a platform to push its position on a number of issues in the region.” – Dr. Theodore Karasik, Director of Research and Consultancy at the Dubai-based Institute for Near East and Gulf Military Analysis

Dr. Theodore Karasik, Director of Research and Consultancy at the Dubai-based Institute for Near East and Gulf Military Analysis (INEGMA), told IPS: “Russia could use this unity government as a platform to push its position on a number of issues in the region.”

“The Kremlin and the Russian Defence Ministry are beginning to make large inroads into the region, capitalising on perceived Western mistakes to win over countries on issues that are up in the air.”

For more than a decade, Russian foreign policy has ostensibly been against intervention of foreign powers in the affairs of other sovereign nations and it has increasingly viewed the Middle East as a good example to prove its point, highlighting the chaos and violence following direct U.S.-Western military action or support in various states.

And it has positioned itself as a peacemaker, trying to avert the same Western mistakes in Syria by pushing for a solution to the country’s internal conflict that does not involve U.S. military action.

This has given it an enhanced, if far from dominant, role in a region where it is already a major arms supplier to a number of regimes and has important relationships with key states such as Israel and Iran, among others.

Its support for, and role as part of the Middle East Quartet, in bringing about a unity government in an explosive part of a highly troubled region, will cement its position there, say Russian analysts.

It will also help to solidify support from others for its view that U.S.-led solutions for the region, and by extension other troubled parts of the world, are fatally flawed.

“Russia is looking for a position in the Middle East, utilising the perception of U.S. and Atlanticists’ mistakes that have led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people in the region,” said Karasik.

“The idea of a Palestinian government is not just about a two-state system but about an Arab initiative to solve problems between internal factions, Hamas and Fatah, and bringing calm and peace in a wider area that goes beyond just Gaza.”

“Moscow is then aligned with Arab states supporting this and can say that it is working on this as a mediator and bringing peace just as it was right at the time when U.S. President Barack Obama was about to bomb Syria,” Karasik added.

Indeed, defence analysts say that many countries in the region already view U.S. policy on Ukraine as misguided and are likely to side with Russia in opposition to the Western sanctions that have been imposed on it in the wake of its annexation of Crimea.

Russia’s emphasis on stability in the region is also tied to the Kremlin’s domestic agenda. The spate of colour revolutions in neighbouring and geographically close states in the last decade, as well as the recent Arab spring uprisings, have left Russia’s political elite aghast.

Fears of something similar happening in Russia, which intensified deeply following the revolution in Ukraine earlier this year, have been behind a severe crackdown on civil liberties and basic rights in Russia, rights watchdogs have said.

By acting as a peacemaker parading the benefits of stability in countries in the Middle East – and therefore the rejection of Western military-intervention led approaches to resolving other nations’ internal conflicts – and garnering support for that view from other states, the Kremlin is also reinforcing tacit support for its own approach at ensuring order at home.

“It sees itself as looking to prevent chaos from ripping up countries from within, something which ties in with its domestic agenda,” said Karasik.

The Kremlin propaganda machine has repeatedly pushed the idea that the West has been behind foreign revolutions, fomenting and then orchestrating them.

Throughout the Maidan protests in November last year, it painted a picture of the demonstrations being led by Western-backed and funded fascist groups bent on destruction and chaos and ultimately ushering in an illegitimate government doing the bidding of the West and posing a direct threat to Russia.

And it can now point to the conflict in the east of Ukraine as another example of the resultant chaos when the West interferes in other sovereign states.

However, those same problems in Ukraine may mean that Russia will have to forego any ambitions it might have in expanding its influence in the Middle East, say some experts.

Sergei Demidenko, a Middle East specialist at the Institute for Strategic Analysis in Moscow, told IPS: “The Kremlin will not go overboard in its support for the Palestinian unity government, but at the same time it would not be the case that it will not support it.”

“Palestine and the Middle East are not important for Russia in terms of foreign policy because its focus is all on Ukraine and the post-Soviet space at the moment. It will say that it wants to see stability in the [Middle East] region and Palestine, and that may well be true, but it will say that because it needs to say something.”

“Russia’s influence in the Middle East is not as great as some may think and the concern now is on Ukraine, not Palestine.”

Russia may be looking for new overseas partners but the foreign ministry still looks its old self. Credit: Pavol Stracansky/IPS

By Pavol Stracansky
MOSCOW, Jun 3 2014 (IPS)

Aleksander Mizdrakin is convinced he knows who Russia’s future international partners are – and they’re not in Europe, nor is the United States among them.

“Russia should have strong, reliable partners. Considering that the West has introduced sanctions it is very good that Russia has found partners such as China. And not only China. Why not India as well?” the 58-year-old Muscovite told IPS.

“I don’t say Russia should start a new Cold War with the European Union and the United States. However, by showing our capability to cooperate with others we are just showing the West that we are not alone.”Boasts of growing economic cooperation [between Russia and China] also come against a backdrop of, on the surface, notably closer political ties between the two nations

Mizdrakin is far from the only Russian thinking the same way, and his thoughts chime with those of the Kremlin officials who in the last few weeks have been trumpeting Russia’s burgeoning relationship with China.

Just last month Moscow and Beijing signed a 400 billion dollar gas supply deal. At the same time it was reported that China’s 575 billion dollar sovereign wealth fund wanted to increase its investment in Russia, while the Kremlin said that both Russia and China were looking to use their own currencies more predominantly in trade deals.

The boasts of growing economic cooperation also come against a backdrop of, on the surface, notably closer political ties between the two nations. When Russia annexed Crimea earlier this year, China abstained in a U.N. Security Council vote on a motion declaring the referendum in the peninsula on joining Russia illegal.

Moscow claimed the move showed it had Beijing’s support and during a high-profile trip to Shanghai last month, Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke gushingly of China and its close relations with Russia, saying “Russia-China cooperation … has reached the highest level in all its centuries-long history.”

Russian media, much of which is de facto state-controlled, has since been filled with reports and editorials suggesting Moscow and Beijing could be about to form a new international bloc and reshape the existing world order.

But despite what many like Mizdrakin may think, that ordinary Russians will get any benefit out of a closer relationship with China is highly questionable.

Russia’s economy has been stuttering since the financial crisis and is locked in deep stagnation. Heavily reliant on resource-sale revenues, other more dynamic sectors remain woefully underdeveloped while the legacy of its Soviet planning – including the existence of subsidy-reliant one industry towns – has been hard to shake off.

The country has also struggled to attract investment with foreign companies citing rule of law problems, bureaucracy and corruption as major turn-offs to moving into Russia.

What prosperity there is is also highly concentrated. According to a report last year by investment bank Credit Suisse, Russia has the worst income inequality in the world, with 35 percent of all household wealth in the hands of 110 people.

And while the average wage in the country is nominally somewhere over the equivalent of 900 dollars per month, earnings vary considerably in regions and sectors and many ordinary Russians have a far lower wage.

According to Russia’s Federal State Statistics Service, 13 percent of the population live in poverty.

Experts say that these things are not going to change, no matter what trade links the Kremlin may or may not be developing with the East.

Ian Bond, director of foreign policy at the Centre for European Reform think tank in London, told IPS: “Chinese investment is not going to solve the fundamental problems of the Russian economy.

“Some changes would take decades of everyone working together to implement them, and in Russia that is not really going to happen.

“And at the same time, Russia will remain suspicious of any foreign investment, including that from China, in strategic areas of its economy.”

Popular support for the Kremlin and its policies, especially foreign policy, is generally high. The main source of news and information for the majority of Russians remains TV, almost all of which is directly or implicitly state-controlled.

When questioned, many say that closer ties to China are a good thing for Russia. But some admit that it is hard to see how exactly the economy, and they themselves, will benefit from it.

Yevgeny Seleznev, a 47-year-old from St. Petersburg, told IPS: “Take the recent gas contract – we won’t see what the results are of that for years to come. It’s the same with any Chinese investment into Russia, its effects won’t be clear for a long time. People are saying a lot at the moment … but I wouldn’t jump to any conclusions.”

The seemingly closer political ties between the two countries may also have their limits.

While human rights watchdogs in particular have been repeatedly dismayed by the two states’ reciprocal support at international level, for example in the U.N. Security Council over rights abuses in Syria, some experts say Beijing and Moscow have only supported each other when they have had something to gain from it themselves.

Bond told IPS: “I can see them cooperating still on common ground. What would be significant is if one or the other were to change their position on something simply to please the other, without it being in their specific interest. But I think it is questionable whether that is going to happen. I don’t see current events as the start of a Sino-Russian international bloc.”

Ironically, the annexation of Crimea may eventually prove to be a point that drives China and Russia apart, rather than together.

Bond added: “In the past China and Russia’s cooperation in the U.N. Security Council was on what is common ground for them, i.e. that foreign powers should not interfere in the affairs of other nations. But Crimea has changed that. Russia has now said that foreign powers should not interfere in the affairs of other nations unless we say so.”

But for people like Mizdrakin, forging closer links with a fellow quasi-superpower ready to provide a bulwark against what many Russians increasingly perceive as an aggressive and unfriendly West, will only do Russia good.

He told IPS: “Russia having partners like China helps create a better balance in the world. [It shows] we are not against cooperation and peace. I think President Vladimir Putin manages that balance very well. He is not looking for conflict, but at the same time he is not afraid of standing up to anyone.”

Flowers laid out in Kiev earlier this year for those who died in the Maidan protests. People who fought for change in Ukraine are hoping the new president will not let them down. Credit: Natalia Kravchuk

By Pavol Stracansky
KIEV, May 30 2014 (IPS)

As Ukraine’s president elect Petro Poroshenko prepares to begin his presidency, Ukrainians are hoping he will not forget that separatist violence is just one of a long list of problems he needs to help solve in the country.

Poroshenko, a billionaire confectionary magnate, won a resounding victory in the first presidential elections this week following the revolution that saw his predecessor, Viktor Yanukovych, ousted in February.

But he comes to office with Ukraine in turmoil, having seen its territory annexed by Russia, separatists in the east of the country waging war, a collapsing economy and many activists and protestors who led the Maidan movement that paved the way for a new regime angry and confused at some of what has come to pass since their protests.“As a Ukrainian citizen, I would hope to see my country developing as a free society that brings opportunities to hard working and honest people” – 32-year-old teacher Yury Shevtsov

And while most Ukrainians agree that unifying the country and putting a stop to the conflict in the east of the country is the new president’s top priority, they say that he must not ignore the many other challenges Ukraine is facing.

Yury Shevtsov, a 32-year-old teacher in Kiev, told IPS: “Getting some stability in the country is important but once the president has done that, as a Ukrainian citizen, I would hope to see my country developing as a free society that brings opportunities to hard working and honest people.”

Prior to the Maidan protests, many Ukrainians perceived the country’s institutions, from the presidency and parliament to the civil service down to the judiciary and police, as systemically corrupt. Nepotism and cronyism were seen as rife.

The country’s human rights record was dubious, with police brutality and persecution of minorities and other groups commonplace.

Third sector organisations, while not facing the kind of intimidation and persecution their peers in Russia or Belarus have been regularly subjected to, complained of obstructions to their work and a lack of cooperation from authorities.

Meanwhile, the economy has been slowly falling apart since the financial crisis, with already low living standards falling further. But despite this, the country’s leaders were seen to be only getting richer and consolidating their grip on power.

While the Maidan protest movement was originally a reaction to Yanukovych’s refusal to sign an Association Agreement with the European Union – seen as a first step on the road to greater European integration – it soon turned into a wider protest against the regime and its failings.

Protestors demanded an end to the corruption and other problems that blighted society, moves to fix the ailing economy and bring at least the hope of some prosperity to the country.

Analysts see Poroshenko’s unexpectedly resounding victory as a reflection of Ukrainians’ demand for change and a regime that will address the country’s problems as much as support for him as an individual candidate.

But they also say that Ukrainians must understand that the new president alone will not be able to effect the kind of changes the country needs.

Balazs Jarabik, a scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, told IPS: “The urgent reforms which need to be undertaken are things like agreeing a deal with the International Monetary Fund to avoid bankruptcy, improving the business climate to attract investment, electoral reforms and decentralisation, curtailing bureaucracy and making state subsidies transparent and justified.

“But they need to be gradual reforms instead of radical ones which could fuel conflict instead of building [society]. There needs to be a lot of communication with, education of, and explanations given to, the average Ukrainian. But importantly, Ukrainians should understand that neither Poroshenko, nor the EU, will do the job for them. The participation of Ukrainians in the reforms is crucial.”

Some NGO groups have already started working with the interim government to help push through legislation related to reforms and say they are seeing important progress made. And Poroshenko has made it clear that he wants to make sure Ukraine signs the Association Agreement with the EU that his predecessor fatefully rejected.

But many Ukrainians are impatient to see some kind of visible improvement in their lives.

As Shevtsov told IPS: “People are fed up with uncertainty and tension and we definitely need some stability in the economy. Corruption, to name just one thing, urgently needs to be dealt with.”

However, economists are not hopeful that Ukrainians, many of whom live with an average wage of just 200 euros a month, will feel any economic improvement in the near future.

Vasyl Yurchyshyn, an economic analyst at the Kiev-based Razumkov Centrethink tank, told IPS: “Ukraine is facing some serious economic challenges over the next few months and there is potential for the recession to continue.

“I am not sure that anyone’s standard of living will be improved in the near future. But at the same time I believe that the government will implement reforms that will expand opportunities for growth and development. But it will be a year or so before any average Ukrainian would feel any difference.”

The progress of any reforms is also likely to be slowed by the violence in eastern districts.

Although most Ukrainians see unifying the country and ending the conflict with separatists as Poroshenko’s top priority, analysts say that concentrating solely on this could hurt the Ukraine’s prospects.

Jarabik told IPS: “The more Ukrainians will have to focus on Russia, the less time and energy they will have to build a new Ukraine.  The key issue is whether the majority of Ukrainians will want to build or to fight.”

But many people in Ukraine continue to believe that it is only by dealing with the separatists – or their backers in Moscow – and bringing peace to a unified state that any rebuilding can begin.

Nadezhda Vlassovskaya, a 31-year-old accountant from Kiev, said: “Starting to talk to Russia officially is needed and by doing so I think that would bring some hope to Ukrainians that our new leader has started to sort things out.”

International bodies and local campaign groups have repeatedly criticised Russia for not doing anywhere near enough in terms of providing prevention services or access to medical treatment for HIV/AIDS sufferers. The fourth Eastern Europe and Central Asia (EECA) HIV/AIDS Conference, which finished in Moscow last week, has not put a stop to that criticism.

Boycotted by many domestic and international organisations working with HIV/AIDS sufferers and those most at risk of contracting the disease, the conference – and the Russian authorities’ overall approach to HIV/AIDS – was accused of blatant hypocrisy.

The critics said that the hosting of the event in Russia, which has one of the world’s highest HIV/AIDS incidence rates, is a slap in the face for people in Russia with the disease or at risk of contracting it.

And as ministers trumpeted their supposed good work, sufferers were continuing to be denied prevention services and treatment widely available in other developed states, campaigners said.

Anya Sarang, head of the Moscow-based Andrei Rylkov Foundation for Health and Human Rights group, told IPS: “Giving any support to this conference is verging on the criminal. The conference shows not just the hypocrisy of a country with the worst HIV policy in the region, if not the world, but is also a waste of valuable money.

“It is much easier [for Russia] to organise a conference and talk about how much money has been spent on HIV than to build effective systems to deliver HIV prevention and care.”

Russia has one of the world’s fastest growing HIV/AIDS epidemics, according to groups like UNAIDS and the World Health Organisation (WHO) and HIV incidence has continued to rise in recent years. There were 77,896 new cases officially registered in 2013 – 10.1% higher than in 2012 – according to the Russian Federal AIDS Centre.

Russian officials speaking at the conference, however, praised their own work on tackling the disease.

“It is much easier [for Russia] to organise a conference and talk about how much money has been spent on HIV than to build effective systems to deliver HIV prevention and care.”
Health Minister Veronika Skvortsova pointed out that Russia’s HIV infection rate is currently 463 out of every 100,000 people, but that “in other countries that boast of their preventive efforts, the prevalence is higher. In the United States, 600 out of 100,000 people are infected and, in Brazil, the infection rate is about 500.”

Critics point out though that there is no way of independently checking these figures as Russia does not supply such data to UNAIDS or the WHO.

Meanwhile, other officials lauded the 3.2 billion dollars that the country had spent on HIV/AIDS between 2006 and 2013 and said that treatment and detection programmes were well funded.

But international bodies and local campaign groups are also attacking what they say that the government is allowing, or even actively encouraging: the discrimination of at risk groups, particularly drug users.  The latter group, they argue, is key to halting the spread of the disease because research has shown that the epidemic in Russia is being driven by intravenous drug use.

Critics point to repressive drugs legislation, the stigmatisation and discrimination of drug users in society and many primary health care facilities as well as a ban on opioid substitution therapy (OST). Meanwhile, harm reduction programmes, including needle and syringe exchanges, are very limited and receive little or no central government support.

Photo courtesy of Nabarezhnye Chelny NGO

This comes despite the fact that prevention programmes, including OST, are widely implemented in many countries around the world, are recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO), and have been proved to be successful in halting the spread of HIV/AIDS.

Speaking at the conference, Michel Sidibe, Executive Director of UNAIDS, explained how authorities in China, which had once operated a zero tolerance approach to drug use, had seen dramatic success in its fight against the disease following the introduction of OST programmes.

Describing progress in China on HIV prevention as “remarkable”, he said that over the course of six years more than 385,000 patients were enrolled in 800 methadone substitution clinics and that today new HIV infections among patients receiving methadone were close to zero.

“The data from China are bold and clear – harm reduction and substitution therapy are evidence-based programmes that save lives,” he said, adding that drug users in EECA countries should “not be treated like criminals” but given help.

However, the lack of prevention services is not all that is hampering a more effective response to the disease. There are problems for those already diagnosed. Access to anti-retroviral treatment is very low – with as little as eight percent of all those in need of it being able to obtain it in Russia.

Systematic care of those diagnosed with the disease is also inadequate and UN officials have previously told IPS that a lack of integration of patients with HIV into the primary health care system means that they are given a referral to a special treatment centre following diagnosis and then largely forgotten about by their doctors.

Meanwhile, doctors have warned that persecution of homosexuals, drug users and people with HIV/AIDS means that it is impossible to collect accurate data on the spread of the disease.

Gay men are often fearful of admitting to doctors how they became infected and instead say that they contracted it through heterosexual sex. Drug users, who can face long prison sentences in some countries in the region, do the same.

Recent legislation banning the promotion of same sex partnerships and long-standing travel restrictions in some parts of the region for people with HIV have only further marginalised groups in which the disease is spreading rapidly. This presents a major problem in effectively dealing with the epidemic, say doctors, because it prevents them from gaining a clear view of the disease’s epidemiology.

People with HIV/AIDS in Moscow say they have no hope of any help from a government they say has essentially abandoned them.

Ivan Anoshkin, a sufferer from Togliatti in south-west Russia, told IPS: “I don’t have any regular income but they won’t give me any invalidity benefits and I have to do manual work just to make sure I don’t die from hunger.

“HIV/AIDS is hard to treat and in view of the fact that there are no social services or clinics to help, it means I’m on my own with everything. I have to make sure I don’t break down just so I won’t die.”

Muscovites at the entrance to Red Square. Many of Russia’s growing middle class and young people have been dismayed by the recent military invasion of Crimea and President Vladimir Putin’s aggressive policy on Ukraine. Credit: Pavol Stracansky/IPS

By Pavol Stracansky
MOSCOW, May 13 2014 (IPS)

As Russia faces harsh sanctions and growing international isolation over its annexation of Crimea and support of separatists in eastern Ukraine, economists and sociologists are warning that the Kremlin’s international policies may fuel a potentially devastating brain drain.

Many of Russia’s growing middle class and young people, especially in the country’s major cities, have been dismayed by the recent military invasion of Crimea and President Vladimir Putin’s aggressive policy on Ukraine.

And they fear that recently-imposed Western sanctions, though not yet having a major effect on normal life in Russia, could in time wreak havoc on an economy which is already on the verge of recession, threatening their careers and job prospects.

This has already led some to contemplate leaving.“The ideological climate needs to be changed so that people who have left feel comfortable returning to Russia.” -- Andrei Kortunov, head of the Russian International Affairs Council

Roman Kramskoy, a doctor in Novorossiysk in southern Russia, told IPS that he would soon be moving to Germany for a new job as he wanted to “leave for the West for more peaceful circumstances”.

“I wouldn’t say the decision is directly connected with the recent political situation and sanctions against Russia, but it was the final straw which made me take this move.”

He is far from the only one. Local media has reported that some firms, which help relocate Russians abroad, have seen a dramatic rise in enquiries about leaving the country during the first quarter of this year.

Meanwhile, businessmen with internationally trading companies have spoken in the local media about their fears that the economic sanctions imposed by the West will damage their businesses. Those who have their own ventures and assets abroad have said it is now easier for them to relocate abroad to continue their operations than to stay in Russia and risk losing partnerships.

On internet forums, emigration is a major topic of discussion, especially among young people.

Zhenyia Morozova, an 18-year-old student in Moscow, told IPS that she had been considering studying art in London when she was older. But, she said, the imposition of sanctions had prompted her to speed up her preparations to leave.

“The news of these sanctions has worried me and I have started to gather all the information I need about studying in London and have spoken to my parents about money to finance it. I don’t want my dream of studying in London destroyed because of sanctions,” she said.

People line the streets in Sevastopol, Crimea, to capture a glimpse of Russian President Vladimir Putin in his cavalcade as he arrives to celebrate Victory Day. But experts warn that the annexation of Crimea and subsequent Western sanctions could be prompting a brain drain from Russia. Credit: Alexey Yakushechkin/IPS

Any brain drain would be a major problem for Russia. It is already struggling with a shrinking and ageing population – according to United Nations estimates, Russia’s population is set to decline by up to 40 percent between now and 2050. But the effects on its economy could be devastating as it is the brightest and most creative – those with the greatest potential to generate wealth and economic growth – who appear most willing to leave.

According to a 2013 poll by independent polling organisation, Levada, almost a quarter of Russians had considered moving abroad. But the figure was higher among young Russians. Of those who had or were definitely emigrating, almost half were between the ages of 20 and 35.

Professor Andrey Korotayev, an expert on socio-politics at the Russian State University for Humanities in Moscow, told IPS: “For the development of any modern economy, transfer of high-skilled labour is essential.

“What Russia needs is for people in high-skilled sectors of the economy and business to go to the West, gain skills and experience in major corporations etc. and then return, transferring their knowledge and experience and benefiting the Russian economy.”

But in the wake of the Crimea annexation, experts say that some of those planning to leave will now be doing so for good and some of those who have already left will reconsider their plans to return.

Andrei Kortunov, head of the Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC) in Moscow, told IPS: “It is certainly the case that there are those who are going to leave because of recent events, but there will also be those who have left who will decide not to come back because they are concerned about the political climate in Russia.”

The Kremlin is aware of the potential problems Russia could face from a brain drain and local politicians, including Prime Minister Dmitri Medvedev, have spoken of the need to implement reforms and take measures to ensure students and talented professionals stay in the country.

But experts say that, regardless of what happens with Russian involvement in Ukraine, there will have to be a major change in the political and social climate in Russia to either lure those that have left the country back or prevent people from leaving in the first place.

As well as a belligerent foreign policy, Putin has overseen a crackdown on rights since his return to the presidency in 2012 and this has intensified dramatically since the start of the Euromaidan protests and subsequent regime change in neighbouring Ukraine.

The last two months has seen a raft of laws proposed which would severely restrict freedoms of assembly and expression, including a ban on the dissemination of any negative information about the government and Russia’s military as well as the introduction of lengthy jail sentences for minor offences related to unauthorised protests.

The Kremlin has also recently moved to have the websites of independent news outlets and political opposition groups blocked and bring the internet under its control with a set of draconian laws on web use. These came just days after the head of Russia‘s biggest social network, Pavel Durov, left the country after a clash with the state security services over handing over internet users’ data.

Experts say that issues like this need to be addressed to ensure that emigrants will want to return to Russia.

“The ideological climate needs to be changed so that people who have left feel comfortable returning to Russia,” Kortunov said.

Russian riot police prepare to face protestors at a rights rally in St Petersburg. Credit: Straight Alliance for LGBT Equality.

By Pavol Stracansky
MOSCOW, Apr 26 2014 (IPS)

NGOs working in Russia are facing more repression in the form of even tighter legislation on foreign funding as part of what some rights activists say is a concerted campaign to “liquidate” civil society in the country.

Under legislation proposed earlier this month in the upper chamber of Russia’s parliament, NGOs receiving foreign funding could be registered as “foreign agent” without their consent."People feel that they have to go into exile or exercise self-censorship."

The legislation would strengthen an existing law which forces such NGOs to register as “foreign agents” – a controversial term with cold war connotations which affected NGOs says makes it almost impossible for them to work with local partners or government bodies – or face stiff fines and possible jail sentences.

The new proposals have met with stinging criticism from local rights activists who say they are part of a concerted plan by the Kremlin to stifle civil society.

“NGOs are facing legislative restrictions on their work and they are being smeared in media that are trying to create a view of foreign NGOs in Russia as being dangerous to society,” Damelya Aitkhozhina, a researcher for Amnesty International’s Moscow branch, told IPS. “What is happening at the moment is, essentially, an attempt to liquidate civil society in Russia.”

The original “foreign agent” law, introduced in 2012, has been criticised by international rights bodies as well as local campaigners as being unconstitutional and illegal.

NGOs have refused to register, and many are fighting court cases over the legislation. Many say they would rather close than have to declare themselves foreign agents.

The Kremlin has justified the original law and the latest proposals as a necessary step to protect the state against foreign organisations interfering in Russian politics – a claim rejected by critics who say the government is making no distinction between public interest advocacy and political activity.

The proposed amendments to the “foreign agent” law were made as President Vladimir Putin stepped up rhetoric against foreign NGOs, publicly warning of the dangers such third sector groups pose to Russian security.

At a meeting with heads of the state security service (FSB) earlier this month, which was widely reported in Russian media, Putin said security forces must not allow NGOs to “be used for destructive goals” as had been the case in Ukraine earlier this year.

He said that NGOs had sponsored neo-Nazi organisations which had led an unconstitutional overthrow of the legitimate government in Russia’s western neighbour.

Many observers believe that fear of a similar protest movement in Russia is driving the Kremlin to crack down not just on civil society but civil liberties themselves.

Yuri Vdovin, a prominent Russian human rights campaigner, wrote on the St. Petersburg-based Bellona NGO’s website this month of the proposed amendments to the foreign agent law: “The amendments cannot be considered in isolation from [current] trends [of restricting rights].”

In the last two months there has been a raft of laws proposed which would severely restrict freedoms of assembly and expression.

These include proposals to ban the dissemination of any negative information about the government and Russia’s military, not just in mass media and on websites, but potentially also in books, films, documentaries and even videogames.

Meanwhile, proposed amendments to already strict laws on protesting would see a potential five-year jail sentence and increased fines introduced for minor offences related to unauthorised protests.

These come after the arrests of hundreds of peaceful protestors in recent months at demonstrations against the annexation of Crimea and at trials of anti-government protestors.

Rights campaigners say that detentions of protestors are becoming more frequent and that prosecutions for minor protest offences which would previously have not even been considered are now being processed through courts.

The Kremlin has also recently moved to have the websites of independent news outlets as well as political opposition websites blocked.

Aitkhozhina told IPS that while the situation with human rights in Russia had been deteriorating for some time since the return of Putin to the presidency in 2012, things were rapidly becoming “much worse”.

She told IPS: “There are restrictions on civil liberties, on freedom of assembly and speech. People feel that they have to go into exile or exercise self-censorship and there are serious concerns over the arrests of peaceful protestors. Recently proposed legislation will only make this situation worse and what is happening at the moment is highly alarming.

“To compare the current situation in Russia with the Stalinist regime would be an exaggeration, but at the same time the way it is developing and the direction it is moving in is deeply, deeply disturbing.”

It is not just human rights campaigners that are concerned about a government crackdown on rights. Many ordinary Russians are becoming increasingly aware of how their civil liberties are being curtailed.

“It would be wrong to say there was no freedom of speech at all in Russia, but the situation needs to be improved,” Sherzod Kayumov, 39, an engineer in Moscow, told IPS. “People in Russia want more freedom of speech, and it is something we will demand. But it is a constant challenge.”

Diego Cánepa. Credit: Office of the Presidency of Uruguay

By Pavol Stracansky
VIENNA, Apr 17 2014 (IPS)

The Uruguayan government has made a controversial move to regulate the production and sale of cannabis. The government believes that this will help in the fight against drug-related crime and in dealing with public health issues.

The move has been condemned by the UN’s International Narcotics Control Board (INCB), whose president Raymond Yans accused the country’s government of having a “pirate attitude” for going against the UN’s conventions on drugs."It is not our aim that anyone follow us or do what we have done."

Diego Cánepa, secretary of the office of Uruguayan President José Mujica, tells IPS that he believes a regulated marijuana market was the right decision for his country.

Q. How do you feel about your country being labelled “pirates” by the INCB for legalising the marijuana market?

A. Well, the INCB is just one UN body and it is just one opinion. They have a special mandate and that mandate is not to decide what approach each individual country should follow. We have had a discussion over the correct interpretation of the UN drugs conventions. We believe, and we have the evidence to show this, that our interpretation is correct. We followed the original spirit of the convention and we hope that the step which we have taken is the right one to create better control of the marijuana market in our country.

Prohibition was a big mistake in the last 40 years, so we believe that a strictly regulated marijuana market is the best way to fulfil the spirit of the UN drugs conventions.

Q. Do you get frustrated when you hear people from other countries talking about how what you are doing is wrong, for example from countries which have a much more conservative, hard line approach to drugs?

A. We very much respect every opinion. It’s an open discussion. We do not think that we have the whole truth in our hands. We listen very carefully to the opinions of other countries but we defend our sovereign right to do what we think is right for our own country and our people. And we believe that in terms of our health policies this is the best option for Uruguay.

We don’t want to be a model for other countries over this, we just think that this is the best way for our country and we will defend our right to take this option. But we are open to discussion. We think that prohibition is not the answer and overwhelming evidence has shown that it is a mistake. We don’t want to have this kind of policy. We need to have the right to explore a different approach to drugs.

Q. If you find that after a couple of years things are not going well with the legalisation or that you are not seeing the kind of results you want with regards to public health, would you be prepared to go back to a ban on drugs?

A. I think the question is different. First of all, a few years is not enough. You need at least eight, nine or ten years before you can draw any conclusions. We need to have a lot of evidence over a long time period to really understand what effects this policy is having.

Looking at public health, violence, drug consumption – all the evidence shows us so far that by regulating the market and making visible what has until now been an invisible market means that you can control that market better, and control trafficking and then you have less violence. But I think that if that doesn’t happen in ten years then we will have another debate on this. But I do not think we would go back to banning [marijuana]. We would need to find another answer.

Q. Are you happy when you see other countries doing things which are similar to what you have done? For example states in the U.S. which have legalised commercial marijuana sales.

A. Actually, what they have done in Colorado is much more than what we have done. There you are free to buy and sell what you want. They have a different model to us. But there are 18 states in the U.S. where marijuana can be bought for medical purposes. But that is just an euphemism because we know that the majority of people use marijuana not with a medical purpose but with a medical excuse.

We see that an individual state in the U.S. is operating this way with no federal overrule on it so it is impossible to not accept that there is a big, open debate on this when you have different countries around the world taking different approaches to the problem.

Q. Could you see other countries following your lead and regulating their marijuana markets?

A. I really don’t know and it is not our aim that anyone follow us or do what we have done. We do not want to be a model for any other country. We respect everyone else’s policies but we think that this is the best model for our country.

An OST patient in Simferopol, Crimea. OST programmes are to finish soon following annexation of the region by Russia. Credit: HIV/AIDS Alliance Ukraine.

By Pavol Stracansky
KIEV, Apr 16 2014 (IPS)

As local authorities prepare to put an end to opioid substitution treatment (OST) programmes in the newly annexed Crimean peninsula, drug users there say they are being forced to choose between a return to addiction and becoming refugees.

OST – where methadone and buprenorphine are given to opioid addicts under medical supervision – has been available in Ukraine for almost a decade.

But Russian law forbids its provision, and Russian government officials have said they intend to close OST services in the region by the end of this month."We don’t know what the future holds. Without substitution therapy, I will die."

Organisations working to provide services to drug users on the peninsula say this has put the future health of more than 800 people receiving OST in the region in doubt.

They say that distances to the nearest facilities in Ukraine offering the treatment mean it would be impossible for drug users to access OST services without leaving Crimea permanently.

Without this lifeline treatment, they warn, many users will turn back to dangerous drug habits, reverting to crime or prostitution to support their addiction, and sharing contaminated needles.

Anton Basenko, a member of the All Ukrainian Association of OST Participants, told IPS: “Many of these people, just like me, have HIV, hepatitis C and other chronic diseases complementing their drug dependence. Stopping substitution therapy for the majority of them is the same as denying them oxygen to breathe. They are being thrown back to crime and despair.”

Drug users in Crimea who spoke to IPS said they were dreading their futures without OST.

One 32-year-old drug user from Sevastopol, a mother of one who gave her name only as Ludmila, told IPS: “I am hoping to start a full-time job in a few weeks but this will be impossible for me if I cannot receive OST. My husband, who also receives OST, currently has a job but he will lose it if he stops getting his treatment. Ending these programmes will be a disaster for this whole family.”

Another, who gave his name only as Vitaliy, told IPS he had been helped by the OST he had been receiving for the last four years. He said he did not want to leave his home in Sevastopol but was afraid of what might happen to him if he did not.

The 27-year-old said: “I don’t want to go but at the same time I don’t want to return to injection drug use.”

A 37-year-old man who asked to be called ‘Yevgeny Kovalenko’ (not his real name), who has been receiving OST in Simferopol since 2008, said he faced a stark choice.

He told IPS: “I am scared, my friends are scared. We don’t know what the future holds. Without substitution therapy, I will die. And that is not me just being dramatic or using a figure of speech, I will literally die.  So will many others.”

Groups such as the HIV/AIDS Alliance in Ukraine say some drug users have already left Crimea to ensure they can continue to access OST. The Alliance is preparing for hundreds to arrive in Kiev looking for help when the programmes close in Crimea.

But while those who make it to Kiev will be able to get help, those that cannot, or choose not to leave their homes in Crimea, will be left to deal with their addiction in a region where local authorities will be enforcing repressive Russian policies on drugs.

Under Russian legislation, minor drug offences are punished severely with, for example, convictions for possession of even the smallest amounts of heroin – including residue in a syringe. Such offences carry lengthy jail sentences.

Russia has one of the world’s fastest growing HIV/AIDS epidemics, which UNAIDS and other bodies say has been historically driven by injection drug use.

Ukraine, which also has a serious HIV/AIDS epidemic, has recently reduced the rate of new HIV infections – a success put down to the widespread implementation of harm reduction programmes.

It is unclear at the moment what effect Crimea becoming part of Russia will have on the provision of harm reduction services other than the OST programmes.

Ukrainian groups working with drug users say there are more than 14,000 people in Crimea who access such services, and that any threat to their provision could have devastating consequences for their health and create a serious public health threat in Crimea.

Meanwhile, drug users in Kiev are calling on the Ukrainian Ministry of Health to act.

They say that, even if they cannot persuade authorities in Crimea to allow the extension of OST programmes at least until January next year, when all legislation in the peninsula should be brought fully into line with that of the rest of Russia, the ministry should be setting up facilities for OST programmes in other parts of Ukraine.

Basenko told IPS: “Practical steps need to be taken to organise the accommodation of these refugees, these patients from Crimea, so they can continue their treatment in Ukraine.

“Drugs available in Ukraine must be redistributed and additional OST facilities need to be set up to meet the needs of these patients.”

Muscovites at the entrance to Red Square. Experts say the impact of any strong Western sanctions would be felt by ordinary Russians. Credit: Pavol Stracansky/IPS.

By Pavol Stracansky
MOSCOW, Mar 20 2014 (IPS)

As the West imposes what have been called the most comprehensive sanctions on Russia since the end of the Cold War, many ordinary Russians say they have no fear of any economic measures the United States or the European Union may take against their country.

Since the Russian invasion of the Crimean peninsula at the end of last month, Western leaders have been threatening Moscow with economic sanctions.

The threat of sanctions sent stocks on Russian exchanges tumbling and added to what has been a massive capital flight – when investors pull money out of a country’s economy – since the start of the year.There is resolute confidence among many ordinary Russians that Russia is more than strong enough to withstand any economic assault.

Economists say that the already ailing Russian economy could be severely affected if harsh, targeted sanctions were implemented.

The referendum in Crimea at the weekend – condemned by much of the international community as illegitimate and illegal and which has resulted in the region being set to become part of Russia within possibly months – has now brought the first round of those sanctions.

So far, the EU sanctions will see EU-wide assets of 21 Russian and Crimean individuals identified as linked to unrest in Crimea frozen while those same people face a travel ban. The U.S. sanctions are similar but apply to 11 people.

And although widely seen as limited in scope, further measures have been pledged by the U.S. and the EU if Russia does not move to de-escalate the crisis.

While the Russian government and other politicians have responded by preparing a series of counter measures, there is resolute confidence among many ordinary Russians that Russia is more than strong enough, economically and politically, to withstand any economic assault the West launches at it. The street mood seems defiant, even if economists warn of consequences in the face of strong sanctions.

This confidence is being bolstered by reports in the Russian media, much of which is controlled by the Kremlin.

Since the invasion of Crimea, local media has portrayed the West as colluding with an illegal and reprobate Ukrainian government bent on oppressing the majority ethnic Russian population in Crimea.

It has also played on the widespread belief among Russians that Crimea is naturally a part of Russia – it was made part of Ukraine in 1954 by then Soviet leader Nikita Krushchev. Russian media has now posited Russia as a liberator securing the safety of its citizens in a land unfairly taken from it.

It has also emphasised the country’s military might. On Sunday the head of the state broadcasting network Russia Today, Dmitri Kiselev, spoke on his news show of how Russia remained the only country in the world capable of reducing the U.S. to “radioactive ash”.

Such talk has created a renewed sense of Russian power among many. In a survey by the independent Levada polling agency released this week, two thirds of Russians see Russia as a global superpower – up 16 percent since 2011.

Crucially, newspapers have carried reports saying that the sanctions will only push Russia closer to China and other Asian states and strengthen economic ties with them, replacing any lost trade with the West.

Maria Yemelianenko, 29, a supermarket worker in Moscow, seemed to sum up the general mood among Russians towards Western sanctions. She told IPS: “Russia is a huge country and sanctions could not affect us like they have with other countries in the past. We have a lot of our own resources.

“I am sure President Putin knows what he is doing, and the people of Russia will not go hungry.”

But while many Russian politicians have dismissed the potential effects of sanctions, not everyone is convinced there will not be some repercussions for the Russian economy.

Alexei Kudrin, a member of the Presidium of the Russian president’s Economic Council, was quoted by the Yandex.ru news website as saying that economic growth could be affected negatively and that both foreign and domestic investment could be hurt.

Dmitry Seleznev, 52, an economist at a large agricultural production company in St Petersburg, told IPS that the Russian economy would feel the effects of sanctions.

He said: “Investment growth will fall, the economy may lose its chance to come out of its current stagnation and exports could fall.”

Some economic fallout from the Crimean crisis has already been seen. Russian stocks have been losing heavily since the start of the year, but the falls deepened in the run-up to the referendum at the weekend.

Global investment houses issued warnings last week that foreign investors were pulling their money out of the country at a record rate because of Russia’s involvement in Crimea and that as of the end of last week, financial outflows from Russia had reached 45 billion dollars since the start of 2014 – a 60 percent rise from the first quarter of 2013.

Gross domestic product (GDP) growth forecasts have also been slashed and some stock market analysts have spoken of long-term damage being done to Russia’s ability to attract investment because of negative perceptions of Russia among foreign investors.

Other experts believe though that while the current sanctions imposed by the U.S. and the EU are limited, further sanctions would indeed have the potential to make life ‘difficult’ for ordinary Russians.

Ian Bond, Director of Foreign Policy at the Centre for European Reform think-tank in London, told IPS: “The EU may be forced into a position where it has to apply broader sanctions, for example, to shut Russian banks out of European financial markets. And the U.S. can make life really difficult by denying Russia access to the U.S. system for dollar transactions.

“That sanction has had a major impact on the Iranian economy, for example, and would be noticed by ordinary Russians.”

He added that at that point support for President Putin, which is currently high among the general Russian population, could begin to wane.

He said: “Whether Putin’s popularity would be affected depends on how effective his propaganda operation is. So far it seems to be working well – his popularity in Russia seems to have risen since the takeover of Crimea, and a lot of people seem to be swallowing the fairytale that the new Ukrainian government is full of fascists and anti-Semites.”

One asset manager running a Russian equity fund who spoke to IPS, but asked not to be named, said that Russia’s economy would be in trouble if people’s worst fears were realised and the current situation escalated into armed conflict.

“The country would then be facing huge economic problems,” he said.

This is one thing which Russians do not want though. Despite their support for Crimea’s return to Russia and positive view of Moscow’s role in effecting that change, recent polls have shown a majority are against any Russian involvement in a military conflict in Ukraine.

“The referendum in Crimea went peacefully and people will probably eventually understand it was the will of the people there,” said Sergei Mishkhin, a 20-year-old student in Moscow.” I want Russia to have friendly relations with all countries. We are just hoping for peace.”

Crowds waving Crimean and Russian flags in Simferopol in Crimea after the referendum. Credit: Alexey Yakushechkin/IPS.

By Pavol Stracansky
KIEV, Mar 18 2014 (IPS)

As Crimea prepares to become part of Russia following a referendum which much of the international community says has no legitimacy, families on the peninsula are being forced apart by the political upheaval while others are considering leaving the region.

Results of the referendum held Sunday suggest that an overwhelming majority of Crimeans want to become part of Russia, with official results showing that 97 percent of voters backed joining Russia following a turnout of just over 82 percent. Crimea has been a southern republic of Ukraine.

But while many people in cities like Sevastopol, and in Simferopol which is the regional capital, celebrated well into the night after the results were announced, the decision is already taking a toll on many local families.There is a noticeable political divide between younger and older people.

Valery Dorozhkhin, 39, a professor at Simferopol University, told IPS: “There are conflicts in families here. In some you have grandparents whose family roots were in Russia who very strongly support Russia. Then you have their grandchildren who feel Ukrainian and will have voted against joining Russia in the referendum.”

Large parts of southern and eastern Ukraine have historically had close cultural ties to Russia. But these have always been especially strong in Crimea.

Crimea was annexed by the Russian empire in the late 18^th century. But Russians did not form a majority in the region until after World War II.

This came about largely after Soviet dictator Josef Stalin deported the entire population of Tatars – around 200,000 people – en masse to labour camps in central Asia in 1944 on false charges that they had collaborated with Nazis. Nearly half of those deported died of starvation or disease within a year. Russians were moved into Crimea to replace those expelled.

In 1954, then Soviet leader Nikita Krushchev decided to make Crimea a part of Ukraine. Today, 60 percent of the Crimean population is ethnic Russian and even more speak Russian as their first language.

As part of the Soviet Union, any potential ethnic tensions were largely negligible, but since Ukraine’s independence in 1991 there have been calls from separatist groups among the Russian community in Crimea for secession, with waxing and waning support.

The political upheavals across Ukraine in recent months exacerbated those ethnic tensions and the recent run-up to the elections has been marked by, many rights activists and independent observers say, violence and repression against non-Russian communities and those supporting the new Ukrainian government in Kiev.

But there is not just an ideological dividing line between ethnic Russians and Ukrainians. There is also a noticeable political divide between younger and older people.

Of the thousands who turned out in rallies in support of Crimea remaining part of Ukraine ahead of the referendum, many of them, although certainly not exclusively, were from the younger generation.

Many younger people who have never known Crimea as anything other than a part of Ukraine have found themselves confused and in some cases fearful of what life under a different regime will be like.

“It is especially hard for younger people in Crimea at the moment. They see themselves as Ukrainians, they feel Ukrainian,” Dorozhkhin told IPS.

This concern about what will come next has already led to some people considering leaving Crimea. There have been reports of individual families deciding to leave the region, while others are concerned about their work.

Some Ukrainians living in Crimea have said they have lost their jobs for perceived support to authorities in Kiev.

Vladimir Vasylenko, a 37-year-old NGO worker in Sevastopol, sums up the mood of those who are concerned about what the future holds for them.

Speaking to IPS, he is worried and almost tearful, as he explains how he is afraid that Russian authorities’ generally negative attitude to the third sector could put his work in jeopardy. But he says he is also worried because he has no idea what life in general will be like under Russian rule.

“I wonder whether I should leave or not. I sometimes think that yes, I will, but I have older members of my family, my mother and grandmother, who will not leave, who do not want to go. I have to think of them too. I just don’t know what to do. The worst thing is that no one knows what is going to come next.”

Tensions remain in Crimea despite the support shown for a return to Russia in the referendum. The Tatar population, which makes up 13 percent of the Crimean population, boycotted the referendum. There is a growing fear in communities of Tatars, many of whom distrust Russia because of what happened to their grandparents and ancestors under Stalin.

They say that since the Russian occupation, their communities have grown fearful of attacks by armed pro-Russian “self-defence” groups, which they say roam the streets at night.

Some say that they have woken up to find white crosses daubed on their front doors and out of fear of attack they have set up their own self-defence squads controlling areas with Tatar populations, while others guard mosques.

But those who backed integration into Russia now see a bright future ahead for Crimea.

Aleksandr Pavluk, a 54-year-old resident of Simferopol who works in one of Crimea’s key industries, tourism, told IPS: “Everything here is fine after the referendum. We’re all very happy and people are looking forward to being part of Russia.

“We are also hoping to have a good summer tourist season when we expect to see lots of holidaymakers from both Russia and from Ukraine.”

A top level United Nations conference on drugs has highlighted growing divisions between member states on how to move forward in dealing with global drug problems as calls grow for major reforms in approaches to international drug policy.

The High-Level Review at the latest annual session of the U.N. Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) – the chief policymaking body for international drug control – in Vienna assessed last week how the organisation is meeting goals for dealing with the global drug problem ahead of the U.N. General Assembly Special Session on Drugs in 2016."We have been taking a certain approach for 50 years and it hasn’t worked. It’s time to experiment with alternatives.”-- Ann Fordham, executive director of NGO, International Drug Policy Consortium

But it ended with a joint ministerial statement that was only agreed at the very last minute after months of fractious debate, with states failing to agree on a common approach to key points, and proposed paragraphs on issues such as the death penalty absent from the final text.

This, say civil society groups promoting global drug policy debate, underlines a growing split in attitudes towards drugs in U.N. member states between those pushing for liberal reforms and those continuing to follow conservative and repressive approaches which evidence is increasingly showing is failing.

Ann Fordham, executive director of the International Drug Policy Consortium NGO, told IPS at the conference: “The joint ministerial statement always comes out, even if individual member states disagree over some fundamental things. But this year things were much harder, it was much more difficult for countries to agree, and for a while it looked like the unthinkable might happen and they wouldn’t agree and there would be no statement.

“But while there was one in the end, and although it was full of watered-down language, it shows there are growing fractures between states on how to approach drug problems and just how big those differences are.”

A number of U.N. member states have recently either undertaken or are planning fundamental reforms to their drugs policies.

In December last year Uruguay became the first country to legalise commercial sales of marijuana and regulate its production. Commercial sales of marijuana began in the U.S. state Colorado in January while sales of marijuana will begin in Washington state in June.

These developments came just months after Latin American leaders used U.N. platforms to deride the body’s approach to drugs. The president of Guatemala told the U.N. General Assembly that the regulated supply of illicit drugs should be considered while his Colombian counterpart told the same body that the U.N.’s conventions “gave birth to the war on drugs …. that war has not been won.”

These reforms have been praised by many third sector organisations working with drug users and pushing for debate on drug policy. They say reform is desperately needed and a traditional punitive criminal approach to dealing with global drug problems has been shown to have failed.

But the U.N. has slammed drug legalisation. United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) executive director Yury Fedotov told journalists just days before the start of the Vienna Conference that Uruguay’s decision to legalise cannabis sales was “not a solution to dealing with world drug problems.”

The U.N.’s International Narcotics Control Board has labelled the country’s government “pirates” for going against the U.N.’s conventions on drugs.

The apparent distance between U.N. drugs policy bodies’ thinking on drugs and that of individual member states was further evidenced at the conference itself.

Individual country representatives – particularly those from Latin America which has seen decades of horrific violence connected with the drugs trade – spoke vociferously of the need to move away from criminalisation of drug use to a health-based approach to drugs problems.

Colombian minister of justice Gomez Mendez told delegates: “…people have been sacrificed in our actions to tackle the drug problem….we call for more effective ways to achieve the objectives stated in international agreements.”

Meanwhile, representatives of the Ecuadorian government spoke of “the failure of present drug policies” and said “many voices are calling for a change in paradigm in the understanding and approach to the drug phenomenon.”

This was backed up by civil society representatives who spoke in special sessions and meetings during the conference.

Senior U.N. officials too emphasised the importance of preventive measures, rather than punitive criminal justice legislation, in helping deal with problems caused by drugs.

Michel Kazatchkine, U.N. Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, said at the conference that “ciminalisation of drug use, restrictive drug policies and aggressive law enforcement practices are key drivers” of serious public health threats such as of HIV and hepatitis C epidemics among people who inject drugs.”

However, despite these warnings, the joint ministerial statement was released without the use of the term ‘harm reduction’ as such language is still deemed unacceptable by countries like Russia which stringently enforce severely punitive anti-drug policies.

This, argued civil society groups at the conference, shows that the U.N.’s drug policy bodies have abrogated their responsibility as leaders in dealing with the global drug problem, focusing on punitive measures rather than a health-based approach.

Joanne Ceste, deputy director of the Open Society Global Drug Policy Programme told IPS: “For a long time, UNODC has abdicated its responsibility as the global leader for HIV prevention, treatment and care among drug users because it has had such a hard time getting serious about real advocacy on decriminalisation of minor offences.”

However, there is hope that the current divisions between member states’ views on drug policy could end up providing the impetus for important debate ahead of the U.N. General Assembly special session on drugs in 2016.

Fordham told IPS: “What was interesting about watching negotiations on the joint ministerial statement is that usually when they can’t agree, member states just say, ‘OK, let’s just reaffirm what we said last time’, which was in 2009.

“But this time, even though the eventual statement is much weaker than we would have liked, there were many states that said, ‘no we can’t go back to that. Things have changed, we need to come to new agreements on drugs policy’.”

She added: “There are some governments now, ahead of 2016, that are really pushing for global drugs policy to be debated. We have been taking a certain approach for 50 years and it hasn’t worked. It’s time to experiment with alternatives.”

A banner used by pro-Russian supporters during rallies in Simferopol in Crimea. It reads: ‘Crimea, Against Nazism’. Credit: Alexey Yakushechkin/IPS.

By Pavol Stracansky
KIEV, Mar 14 2014 (IPS)

Crimea is facing a violent wave of human rights abuses, activists warn, with kidnappings of journalists and rights campaigners, harassment of non-Russian minorities and reports of growing persecution of anyone thought to be sympathising with the pro-European Kiev government.

They say the autonomous region, now in de facto control of Russian troops, is spiralling into violence and repression ahead of a planned referendum on its future this Sunday.“Come Sunday the Russians will take control and its army will probably change the entire functioning of Crimea. We can only see more protests and more violence.” -- Marina Tsapok, spokeswoman for the Association of Monitors of Human Rights in Ukraine

Marina Tsapok, spokeswoman for the Association of Monitors of Human Rights in Ukraine, told IPS: “People have been kidnapped and are missing. The situation is getting worse, it is completely illegal and we are expecting even more violence, both before the referendum and after it.”

Human rights groups have feared a crackdown on potential opponents of Crimean secession ever since it was announced that the autonomous region would hold a referendum on its future.

The region’s authorities have made it clear they want Crimea to become part of Russia. Pro-Russian support among the local population – 60 percent of which is ethnic Russian – is strong.

Russian propaganda against the new Ukrainian government – which it has painted as an illegally-formed body led by fascists and neo-Nazis bent on destroying the country – has helped foment not just pro-independence sentiment, but also driven mounting antipathy towards supporters of a unified Ukraine in Crimea.

At rallies last weekend, pro-Ukrainian supporters were savagely beaten and whipped by pro-Russian militiamen. In one incident more than 100 men aggressively forced a group of women to end their peaceful protest against Russian military intervention in front of the Ukrainian Naval headquarters in Crimea’s capital, Simferopol. Many such incidents have gone unnoticed or unpunished by police, fuelling fears that pro-Russian groups are now able to violate human rights with impunity.

There have also been reports in the media of Ukrainians in Crimea afraid to leave their homes for fear they will be attacked by pro-Russian groups.

Pro-Ukrainian locals are not the only ones facing harassment though. Activists and journalists attempting to monitor the situation are being targeted.

The Euromaidan information service, which is chronicling and reporting on alleged rights abuses, says there have been a growing number of kidnaps in recent days. The name Euromaidan derives from pro-EU protests in central Kiev over the last several months.

Tsapok also told IPS that on Wednesday this week five people had been reported missing, believed kidnapped. Four were rights activists and another was a former military officer. This came just hours after five people, including journalists and activists, were found alive following abductions.

Others say they have faced death threats for trying to take photos of troops and masked gunmen outside military and civilian buildings.

Meanwhile, the region’s largest ethnic minority – the Tatars – are also under threat.

The Tatars, Turkic Muslims who lived in the region for centuries, were forcibly repatriated from Crimea in 1944. More than 200,000 were sent to labour camps in central Asia when Soviet dictator Josef Stalin accused them of collaborating with the Nazis. Almost 40,000 of them died during the journeys.

Russians were moved in in their place and Tatars only began returning to the region as the Soviet Union began to disintegrate.

They now account for roughly 14 percent of the Crimean population and, because of their history, many remain distrustful of Russia.

Since the Russian occupation, many say their communities have grown fearful of attacks by armed pro-Russian self-defence groups which they say roam the streets at night. They say that they have woken up to find white crosses daubed on their front doors.

Out of fear of attack they have set up their own self-defence squads controlling areas with Tatar populations while others guard mosques.

Heather McGill, a researcher for Amnesty International, told IPS: “These reports of the markings on the doors of Tatar people, of people’s passports being rounded up and taken away for use in the referendum, as well as the kidnappings and other human rights abuses that we are seeing show how bad things are. And, from what we can see, they are only getting worse.”

With the referendum widely expected to back Crimea joining Russia, the Kremlin will be in firm control of the peninsula. This raises questions over whether the new Crimean authorities will adopt Moscow’s current approach to human rights which has been widely condemned by the international community.

McGill told IPS: “It is very hard to see how things will be [concerning human rights] in Crimea if the vote comes out in support of joining Russia. But I would wager it will be worse than things are currently.”

Meanwhile, in Kiev, where the new Ukrainian government continues to work with Western leaders to find a solution to the Crimea crisis, rights activists fear the worse for their partner groups in Crimea as well as the future prospects for civil liberties and basic rights on the peninsula.

Tsapok told IPS: “Come Sunday the Russians will take control and its army will probably change the entire functioning of Crimea. We can only see more protests and more violence.”

But she also appealed for human rights activists and independent media everywhere to ensure that rights violations in Crimea continue to be reported and monitored.

Last week, international rights monitors were stopped from entering Crimea at gunpoint. A team from the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe was turned back by members of local “self-defence” units controlling roads into the region.

Tsapok said: “Crimea today affects everyone. Today’s front line is between legality and lawlessness, between news and propaganda, between civilisation and medieval savagery.

“I say to all friends, please spread information about the situation in the Crimea, about beatings of journalists, kidnapping of civil society activists, the ‘referendum’ at gunpoint. People should not remain indifferent – or tomorrow all these bad things could happen to someone else.”

A post on the Russia-Ukraine border. Demarcation of the border is often flimsy. Credit: Susan Astray/CC2.0.

By Pavol Stracansky
MOSCOW, Mar 6 2014 (IPS)

Elena Smolenskaya doesn’t hesitate a second when asked what she thinks about the Russian military intervention in Crimea. The 23-year-old Moscow student is convinced that President Vladimir Putin had no choice but to order troops into the country.

“The military action was right to protect Russian people in Crimea. This is why the majority of Russian people support what President Putin is doing. He is protecting Russian interests,” she told IPS.“The adoption of more restrictive laws is a possibility against the current backdrop of anti-Western hysteria in state-sponsored and loyalist media.”

Elena’s view is far from uncommon – especially in areas outside the country’s major cities where support for Putin has always been highest – and appears to be growing every day.

Before the Ukrainian revolution polls in Russia had shown that the majority of Russians were against intervention in their western neighbour’s affairs, but the mood appears to have shifted in the last few weeks.

While there were demonstrations in Moscow against the occupation at the weekend – swiftly suppressed with the arrest of hundreds – there were much larger counter protests in support of it. In Russia’s second city, St Petersburg, more than 15,000 turned up at a rally supporting the military operation in Crimea.

Local analysts say that many Russians see the new government in Kiev as strongly anti-Russian and made up of dangerous neo-fascists. This image was reinforced when soon after Moscow-friendly former Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych fled the country, its new leaders proposed a law banning Russian as an official language.

In a survey by the independent Russian Levada polling group at the end of February, 43 percent of respondents described the Ukrainian protests and subsequent revolution as a violent coup, and almost a quarter categorised it as a civil war. A poll by the same organisation showed that a third thought that the overthrow of the Yanukovych regime was led by Ukrainian nationalists supported by Western secret service agents.

Clashes in Eastern Ukraine between pro-Russian locals and supporters of the Kiev government after the revolution reinforced these views.

As attention turned to Crimea, which was part of Russia until 1954 when then Soviet leader Nikita Krushchev made it part of Ukraine republic within the Soviet Union, many agreed with Kremlin claims that military intervention was a necessity to protect the almost 60 percent of Crimea’s population that is ethnic Russian, and help protect a people and culture which many in Russia see as their own.

Vasily Gomelsky, a 56-year-old clerk in Moscow, told IPS: “President Putin is right and I completely support him. He just wanted to protect the Orthodox [Christian] civilisation that has been there for hundreds of years. We were all afraid of what might happen if neo-fascists [in Kiev] take over there.”

Russian media, much of which is formally or informally state-controlled, has widely pushed the same view.

The Komsomolskaya Pravda national daily carried an interview with a 20-year-old Russian activist present at the pro-EU Euromaidan demonstrations in Kiev earlier who claimed that there were “German and American mercenaries” among the protestors leading younger members of the Ukrainian radical far right Pravy Sektor movement.

Criticism of the occupation in any media has been scarce. Where it has occurred it has, in some cases, been swiftly dealt with by the authorities.

Prof. Andrei Zubov of the Moscow State Institute of International Relations – which was founded by and remains institutionally a part of the Russian Foreign Ministry – wrote an article in the Vedemosti national daily condemning the intervention and likening President Putin to Hitler.

In another interview he said that the Russian president had “clearly lost his mind.”

He was sacked early this week. He said he believed the Foreign Ministry had forced his bosses to get rid of him.

Some critics say the professor’s dismissal typifies the approach to dissent of an administration which has been widely condemned by activists and the international community for its crackdown on rights since Putin began his latest presidential term in 2012.

The adoption of controversial legislation on gay propaganda, a crackdown on third sector organisations, repression of political opponents and systematic harassment of activists, among others, have all been cited as examples of Russian authorities’ disregard for rights.

Others warn that new-found support in the wake of the conflict will allow President Putin to pursue even more rigorous curbs on basic freedoms.

“Overall, Putin’s foreign policy commands support. The Crimean conflict will allow him to consolidate the country and the majority of the population will, in the end, support him. It will also allow him to put an additional squeeze on dissent,” Nikolai Sokov, a Senior Fellow at the Vienna Centre for Disarmament and Non-Proliferation (VCDNP), told IPS.

Just last week an anti-terrorist bill giving security forces sweeping powers in cases of suspected terrorism was approved by Russian parliament in a first reading.

The bill included, among other things, heavily-criticised controls of internet use. But it was approved without problems and one MP was reported as saying that critics need only go to Kiev to see why the bill was so desperately needed.

“The bills were actually introduced several weeks ago but the Ukraine conflict ensured they would be adopted,” said Sokov.

Also, the Russian State Agency for Financial Monitoring said Wednesday that it had launched an investigation after uncovering that Ukrainian ultra-nationalists were being funded by the same donor organisations as some Russian NGOs.

Controversial legislation forces NGOs in Russia which receive finance from abroad to be registered as ‘foreign agents’, and are subject to regular checks by local authorities.

Tanya Lokshina, Russia programme director at Human Rights Watch, told IPS: “The news of the investigation is very threatening for all NGOs which receive foreign funding.”

She added: “The adoption of more restrictive laws is a possibility against the current backdrop of anti-Western hysteria in state-sponsored and loyalist media.”

Meanwhile, support for President Putin among ordinary Russians appears firm with many saying it is he, rather than the West, who is looking to avoid escalating the current crisis into a war.

“Some people did fear that [occupying Crimea] could lead to war, but as we have seen, President Putin has acted sensibly with regard to this. He is looking out for Russian interests, not looking for confrontation,” Smolenskaya told IPS.

Russian troops control the streets in the Crimean city Simferopol. Credit: Alexey Yakushechkin/IPS.

By Pavol Stracansky
KIEV, Mar 4 2014 (IPS)

Crimea could remain under Russian control indefinitely as the current crisis – described by some politicians as Europe’s gravest since the end of the Cold War – threatens to turn into a “frozen conflict”, experts say.

The Ukrainian peninsula is now under de facto Russian military control with Ukrainian military bases surrounded, and control of infrastructure and strategic buildings across the region in the hands of Russian commanders.Many in Crimea regard themselves as Russian, and since the break-up of the Soviet Union local secession movements have had varied levels of support.

And despite increasingly harsh rhetoric and threats of the strongest possible diplomatic action from U.S. and European leaders, many experts believe that there is little the West can do to loosen Moscow’s grip on the region.

Ian Bond, Director of Foreign Policy at the Centre for European Reform (CER) think tank in London, told IPS: “Unfortunately, things have got to the point where it looks that the best case scenario for the development of the present situation is that Russian troops end up staying in Crimea, the situation there will remain as it is now, and this becomes a ‘frozen conflict’.”

Crimea, today an autonomous republic in Ukraine, has long had close cultural ties with Russia. It is home to the majority of Ukraine’s ethnic Russians, many of whom came there during the forced repatriation of more than 200,000 Tartars – Turkic Muslims who lived in the region for centuries – in 1944.

They were sent to labour camps in Central Asia and replaced by Russians on the orders of Soviet dictator Josef Stalin who was angry at alleged collaboration between local Tartars and the Nazis during World War II. Tartars today make up a significant minority of Crimea’s population.

The Crimea was also part of Russia until 1954 when then Soviet leader Nikita Krushchev made it a part of Ukraine republic within the Soviet Union.

Russia has maintained a physical presence on the peninsula in the form of its massive naval base in the Black Sea port of Sevastopol, which it holds under a lease agreement with Kiev and which gives Russian troops the right to move around parts of Crimea.

Many in Crimea regard themselves as Russian, and since the break-up of the Soviet Union local secession movements have had varied levels of support.

The Euromaidan protests in Kiev, a series of protests through winter to demand closer integration with the EU, failed to gain support on the peninsula. As the revolution came to an end, calls for independence in Crimea grew louder, as did those for help from Moscow as clashes broke out among pro-Russian and pro-Kiev groups in some parts of eastern Ukraine.

The calls were answered by Moscow with the Kremlin claiming its troops were needed to protect Russian citizens. The troops, although not universally feted by locals, have not faced any aggression.

Locals in Crimea who spoke to IPS said that there was a wary peace in many towns and cities in the region and that the situation was far less tense than the media had been reporting.

Alexandr Yakushechkin, 45, from Simferopol, said: “Things here are actually quiet and peaceful. There are Russian soldiers only in front of two main administration buildings in Simferopol but nowhere else.”

He added that he did not expect Russian soldiers to stay in Crimea past a March 30 referendum on the country’s future status.

But others are already planning for the long-term presence of Russian soldiers and what that could mean for the economy in a region which relies heavily on tourism.

Gala Amarando, who works in the local tourist industry in Simferopol, told IPS: “People in Crimea live for the tourist season and they know things this summer may be complicated. They are already thinking of having to slash prices and ways to attract holidaymakers.”

With Moscow showing no signs of backing down on its intervention and moving more and more soldiers into the peninsula every day, some experts believe Russian troops could become a permanent presence, citing the 2008 invasion of the Georgian breakaway region of South Ossetia.

Georgia had tried to bring the region to heel with force but Moscow sent in troops amid claims that the people of South Ossetia were in danger. Georgia lost one-fifth of its territory in the ensuing battle and while the West imposed sanctions and Russia signed a ceasefire agreement saying it would withdraw troops, it never honoured it fully, and troops remained.

This raises questions over the effectiveness of any potential Western sanctions against Russia this time around.

The CER’s Bond told IPS: “What Russia learnt from the 2008 conflict in Georgia is that there were sanctions for a while and then they were forgotten fairly soon, and Barack Obama came into office and started to try and reset relations between Washington and Moscow.

“What Vladimir Putin may be thinking now is that if no blood is shed, the consequences may not be that bad, and the next U.S. president may try and reset relations with Moscow again. Perhaps Putin is thinking it is worth the risk.”

Some believe that targeted sanctions – particularly against the massive wealth of Russia’s ruling elite held abroad – may have some effect in making the Kremlin at least consider its position, others argue that Crimea will be used by Putin as collateral until he gets what he wants – a government that will have the support of all Ukrainian regions and honour previous deal he had made with Kiev.

Nikolai Sokov, a Senior Fellow at the Vienna Centre for Disarmament and Non-Proliferation (VCDNP), told IPS: “The only thing that can change his mind [about holding Crimea] is an effective government in Kiev that can hold the country together and stick to earlier agreements.”

However, there is a fear that Putin may, having successfully gained control of Crimea, try to intervene in other parts of East Ukraine where pro-Russian sentiment is also strong – with terrible consequences.

Support for Russia and its military is seen as far less clear cut in regions in East Ukraine outside Crimea, and armed conflict between Russian troops and either the Ukrainian army or paramilitary pro-western groups would be almost certain.

Bond told IPS: “While the best case scenario is a ‘frozen conflict’, the worst case scenario is that Putin intervenes in other parts of Ukraine. Then it would get really bad. The consequences of this, not just for Ukraine but the wider world as well, really do not even bear thinking about.”

A protestor at an LGBT rights rally in St Petersburg is led away by police. Credit: Alliance of Heterosexuals for LGBT Equality.

By Pavol Stracansky
MOSCOW, Mar 1 2014 (IPS)

Fears are growing in Russia that the Kremlin is preparing a crackdown on rights activists following the end of the Sochi Winter Olympics.

Activists warn that even under the glare of the world’s media, Russian authorities have shown they are happy to go on committing human rights abuses and muzzle any form of protest and, with the Games over, things could get much worse.The harassment of ecological activists – which had garnered international attention during the Games – has shown no signs of letting up.

“The Kremlin is likely to tighten the screws and intensify repression against independent thinkers even further if, after the Games, Russia’s international partners turn their eyes away from the country,” Tanya Lokshina, Russia programme director at Human Rights Watch told IPS.

Moscow had been criticised by international organisations for its human rights record in the run up to the Games.

The adoption of controversial legislation on gay propaganda, a crackdown on third sector organisations, repression of political opponents and systematic harassment of activists, among others, were all cited as examples of Russian authorities’ disregard for rights.

Amid the growing criticism, amnesties and pardons were granted for prominent rights campaigners just months before the Games started in what was seen by many as a Kremlin PR exercise. And it was expected that during the Olympics, with Moscow looking to improve its world image, there would be little, if any, of the flagrant rights abuses perpetrated before the Games began.

But arrests of activists during the Olympics as well as the detention and public beating of recently amnestied members of the Pussy Riot punk group by Olympic security guards has sent a worrying signal, say activists.

“The authorities have shown no restraint in their clampdown on the freedoms of expression and assembly while the world’s eyes are on Russia. Given this, we can hardly expect improvement after, and we are concerned there will be more repressions against activists and general dissent after Sochi,” Denis Krivosheev, deputy director of the Europe and Central Asia Programme at Amnesty International told IPS.

“Unless legislation introduced in the past two years to limit the rights to freedom of expression, assembly and association is repealed, the message from the authorities is clear: they have armed themselves with tools to prevent people from exercising their rights. And it is not in their plans to do otherwise,” he added.

According to reports in local media, some NGOs have already contacted foreign diplomats in Russia expressing their concerns over a potential crackdown once the Games had finished.

These fears are being further fuelled by the mass anti-government protests and subsequent revolution in neighbouring Ukraine. Some analysts say Putin may look to stamp his authority by dealing harshly with anyone he sees as a threat and send out a strong signal that dissent will not be tolerated.

“Developments in Ukraine could well be used by ideologists in Russia promoting a crackdown to reassert themselves,” Lokshina told IPS.

The authorities’ hardline stance was already in evidence just a day after the Games ended. More than 200 peaceful protesters were arrested outside a Moscow court building where a group of protesters were handed jail sentences, some of up to four years, for their involvement in a 2012 protest on Bolotnaya Square in the capital.

The high-profile prosecution of the protestors was itself condemned by critics as unjust and politically motivated.

At the same time as the arrests it emerged that the harassment of ecological activists – which had garnered international attention during the Games – has shown no signs of letting up.

Two members of the Environmental Watch on North Caucasus (ENWC) NGO were detained as the Games came to a close.

Both say they were walking down the street in Sochi when officers stopped them and ordered them to go to a police station where they were charged with refusing to adhere to a police order.

One of them, David Khakim, was this week given a four-day jail sentence.

Members of the NGO, which was at the forefront of campaigning against environmental damage caused by the Games to the region around Sochi – part of a UNESCO World Heritage Area – have faced years of harassment for their work.

The group highlighted not just activities which have made life unbearable for some people in villages near the Games sites such as illegal dumping and water pollution, but also the destruction of thousands of hectares of rare forests, spawning sites for endangered fish, hibernation sites and migration routes for animals.

It also drew attention to how legislation had been passed and amended to allow for the construction of Olympics venues and related infrastructure in the Sochi national park – legislation which just last week the Russian branch of the WWF said would allow for the legal exploitation and degradation of the environment for years to come.

But the group’s work came at a price. Members of the group have repeatedly faced arrests, detentions, personal searches and police questioning.

Another ENWC activist, Evgeny Viteshko, was repeatedly arrested in the months before the Olympics, and during the Games was jailed for three years for violating a curfew imposed as part of a 2012 suspended sentence in connection with an environmental protest.

His arrest, trial and sentencing have caused outrage among rights groups and for some his case has become symbolic of the repression rights activists face in Russia.

The group was unavailable for comment but members had previously told IPS that they were not expecting any let up in harassment while they continued their activities.

With the post-Sochi outlook for rights groups in Russia looking grim, some campaigners say these Olympics will be remembered as much for what happened outside as inside the sporting venues.

“People will recall the Games as much for the host nation’s disregard for human rights as for the sporting action that took place during them,” Lokshina told IPS.

Independence Square in Kiev on Monday. In the aftermath of the revolution Ukraine now faces a difficult path to EU integration. Credit: Natalia Kravchuk/IPS.

By Pavol Stracansky
KIEV, Feb 25 2014 (IPS)

Ukrainians are facing years of pain and upheaval if the country moves towards closer EU integration – or the prospect of the country being left to “rot” if they do not, experts say following the weekend’s revolution.

European leaders have pledged support for the East European state following the overthrow of Viktor Yanukovych’s regime while the interim government has suggested it will push for closer ties with Europe.

Although this will please many who took part in the protests over the last three months – as well as enrage many in the generally pro-Russian eastern and southern parts of the country – some analysts have warned there should be no illusions about what Ukraine will gain, and lose, if it starts on the long path to EU integration."They do not know entirely what kind of pain they will have to endure and that they will have to make their way through a valley of tears."

“The people who will gain from European integration expect some ‘pain’ as reforms are undertaken, such as unemployment and economic problems,” Lilia Shevstova, senior associate at the Moscow Carnegie Centre, told IPS.

“But they do not know entirely what kind of pain they will have to endure and that they will have to make their way through a valley of tears. And if they fail or stumble, Ukraine will rot and collapse.”

While the months-long demonstrations which culminated in the ousting of Yanukovych had become a protest over the wider failings of the former president’s regime long before they reached their bloody end, European integration – or the lack of it – remained one of the key drivers of demonstrators’ discontent.

The initial mass gatherings on Kiev’s Independence Square following news that there would be no signing of an EU Association Agreement offering free trade underlined how important many Ukrainians felt closer ties to Europe were.

The EU says that this agreement is on the table once again.

Some analysts say that while it offers long-term economic benefits, these only come following reforms that would be largely costly and unpopular.

It is questionable whether a population which has already endured years of a faltering economy and its effects will be able to keep its enthusiasm for the EU over the many years it would take for the reforms to be fully carried out.

“These structural reforms will demand an enormous effort from Ukrainians,” Balasz Jarabik of the Central European Policy Institute in Slovakia told IPS. Slovakia joined the EU in 2004 after many difficult years spent transforming its economy and meeting EU criteria.

At the same time, closer European integration could have severe consequences for much of Ukraine’s heavy industry as relations with Russia become strained and trade links with its Eastern neighbour are lost. Russia is one of Ukraine’s most important economic partners and the export destination for goods from much of the country’s industrial-military complex.

“Those sectors of the Ukrainian economy which are Soviet in origin, including those linked to the military and to Russian industry, will suffer heavily, collapsing or being restructured,” Shevstova told IPS.

“Even the people who are left working at obsolete plans and factories will suffer. This will be the price of restructuring.”

Apart from what the EU could do, if anything, to compensate this long-term destruction of industry, it is unclear whether it can, even in combination with other international partners, come up with a sufficient package to help the Ukrainian economy meet its immediate financial needs, estimated at around 35 billion dollars this year.

Jarabik told IPS: “While it is not that big an amount as a proportion of EU GDP and the financial support should come from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) anyway, taking into account the political consequences [of such a move] as well as in the context of the Greek and Cypriot bailouts, I don’t think EU taxpayers have much appetite for bailing out Ukraine.”

However, for many pro-European Ukrainians it is not just enhanced trade benefits an Association Agreement offers that makes the EU important. Many feel it will finally turn Ukraine away from Russia and its ideological and social influences.

Critics of the Yanukovych administration accused it of being a Kremlin puppet regime, with corruption, cronyism, nepotism and a flagrant disregard for human rights mirroring the ways of Moscow.

As the protests went on, some demonstrators said they faced a straight choice between Ukraine under Yanukovych being essentially a Russian vassal state adopting repressive Kremlin ideology, or a modern country functioning under EU principles of a rule of law and with an open, free society.

But many Ukrainians say not everyone is fully aware what they will get out of closer ties with the EU and signing an Association Agreement which brings only limited economic benefits.

Vera Kovalenko, a sales assistant from Kiev, told IPS: “Of the people that protested, few had read the Association Agreement. Most thought that immediately after it was signed they would be able to travel to Europe without a visa and that there would be an end to corruption in Ukraine and life would be like it is in Europe. That wasn’t going to be the case.”

Much has also been made in Western media of a perceived anti-EU stance among the population of the East and South of the country which is home to about a sixth of Ukraine’s population that is ethnic Russian.

Widespread antipathy to the recent protests and often very public pro-Russian sentiment in the region has led to European integration being framed as a West and North Ukraine vs. East and South Ukraine struggle.

But this is not the case, say some.

Vladimir Pavlenko, 42, a salesman, from Kiev, told IPS: “The EU is a divisive issue, but less so for younger, educated people. They want closer ties with the EU almost regardless of what region they are from.

“Among older people, those from the West and North are more pro-EU, while those from the East and South are more pro-Russian. But, most of them have no idea what the EU really is anyway.”

Meanwhile, others see a bright future for a Ukraine allied neither to Europe nor to Russia.

Katia Gerus, 39, a secretary from Donetsk in Eastern Ukraine, told IPS: “I don’t think Ukraine should join the EU. We just need to consolidate the situation in the country and then we can move on as an ordinary, independent country open to cooperation with all countries.

“We have our own resources and can find our own path ahead. We have an opportunity to do things properly on our own.”

The police battling protesters in Kiev. Concerns continue about unrest even if the violence dies down. Credit: Natalia Kravchuk/IPS.

By Pavol Stracansky
KIEV, Feb 21 2014 (IPS)

As Ukraine’s capital experiences the worst violence in its post-Soviet history, some protestors are warning that the festering discontent with the regime which led to the current crisis is unlikely to disappear overnight even if a solution to the current impasse is found.

When the anti-government protests began in November they were ostensibly a mass reaction to the decision by President Viktor Yanukovych to turn his back on the first stage of EU accession.“People having had enough of Yanukovych, the corruption and the economic situation have all aroused the anger that has brought people onto the streets." -- Masha Kostishyn, an unemployed economist

But they soon became as much an expression of distaste and frustration with the ruling regime as any single political decision.

“This all started with the abrupt decision not to sign the agreement with the EU, but there was more to it than that. Everyone was completely fed up with Yanukovych’s regime,” Valerii Drotenko, a 45-year-old protestor told IPS.

Since coming to power in 2010, civil liberties have been eroded, political opponents have faced severe repression, and the independence and integrity of law enforcement agencies has all but disappeared, local and international rights groups say.

At the same time the perception of massive corruption, cronyism and nepotism within the regime has grown among the general population. Critics have pointed to Yanukovych concentrating political power in his own office and at the same time building his own family into a wealthy and socially dominant force.

On top of all this, Ukraine’s economy has struggled desperately since the financial crisis in 2008. Its currency is close to collapse, trade and budget deficits have ballooned and the country has been stuck in a recession for the last 18 months.

Masha Kostishyn, 34, an unemployed economist who lives in Kiev, told IPS: “People having had enough of Yanukovych, the corruption and the economic situation have all aroused the anger that has brought people onto the streets. But this would all be more civilised if the economic situation was better. As it is, at the moment it only helps to create chaos and anger.”

Ukraine’s dire economic situation and an accompanying inability to attract foreign investment has pushed it to be more and more reliant on trade with Russia, especially in the east of the country where much of Ukraine’s heavy industry is concentrated.

Already culturally close – one-sixth of the Ukrainian population is ethnic Russian – this has given the Kremlin an extra lever to strengthen its political influence on Kiev.

But, experts say, this has only pushed more of the population away from the government, especially in Western Ukraine which has traditionally been seen as more pro-European.

The sudden U-turn in late November when Yanukovych backed out of the deal and appeared to pledge the country’s future direction to its Eastern neighbour was the breaking point for many who feared Ukraine would become little more than a Kremlin puppet state embracing Russia’s model of state capitalism, and political and social repression.

Violence and killings over the past month, particularly the horrendous bloodshed of the past few days, has only deepened the general resentment towards the regime.

But while the opposition sticks to its calls for Yanukovych to go, even if they succeed in their demands eventually, many protestors say they hold little faith in the potential replacements.

The main opposition party, The Fatherland, is viewed by some as little more than another corrupt part of the political establishment.

Drotenko told IPS: “The authorities are criminal by their nature [but the] opposition is just another side of the same coin.

“They were pretty comfortable in their role as a ‘puppet’ or ‘decorative’ opposition, being paid by the same oligarchs as the ruling party and ignoring the voices of the people in the same way as Yanukovych has.”

He added: “Most of the people out protesting in Kiev are far from zealous backers of the opposition.”

Others have pointed to the radical far-right politics of the Svoboda party which is one of the major opposition movements involved in the protests.

Some protestors have blamed a lack of cohesion and inaction among opposition leaders in the past months for not bringing a swift end to the crisis in the early weeks of the protests.

“Yanukovych is certainly stupid and is to blame because of his criminal actions, but the opposition is also culpable for its not taking action quickly and decisively in the weeks after the protests began,” said Drotenko.

The horrific violence of the last few days has prompted a flurry of diplomatic action from the EU, the U.S. and Russia and early Friday a deal was agreed between the opposition, Yanukovych’s administration and Russian and EU diplomats to bring an end to the crisis. A key element of that deal is an early election.

But there is disappointment among some in Kiev that diplomatic efforts have come only now, and there is continuing unease over the underlying tensions.

Olga Kovalchuk, 37, a teacher in Kiev, told IPS: “Perhaps while this was a purely political conflict, before it escalated into violence, some form of action from the EU or Russia might have worked, but not any more. They missed their chance.”

Kiev in flames on Tuesday night. Credit: Natalia Kravchuk/IPS.

By Pavol Stracansky
KIEV, Feb 19 2014 (IPS)

Bloody clashes that have left more than a score dead and more than a 1,000 injured in the Ukrainian capital could continue for weeks. Local people say there is now “no way back” for either side in what has become the worst crisis in the country’s post-Soviet history.

Protests began in Kiev at the end of November after President Viktor Yanukovych turned his back on a deal which would have seen Ukraine forge closer ties with the European Union and move towards eventual accession to the group.“I know that all the hospitals in the country are emptying out non-essential patients and making room for the people that will be injured in these clashes."

They turned violent in mid-January after the passing of a set of controversial laws designed to stifle anti-government demonstrations and opposition movements.

There was some hope of progress at the start of this week when an amnesty was granted to hundreds of people detained during the protests and the government appeared to be considering concessions. But violence flared as Yanukovych pulled back on plans to agree the appointment of a new government or to have his own wide-ranging powers curtailed.

Protestors marched on parliament and ransacked buildings while security forces began firing on them.

As deadly battles raged and parts of the city became what residents told IPS are a “flaming battleground”, emergency meetings between opposition leaders and the government failed to produce any resolution, with each side blaming the other for causing the violence.

Protestors have told IPS that the death toll will rise in coming days, and that they see no end in sight to the bloody conflict.

Alexander Pyvovarov, a volunteer doctor who has been working at field hospitals set up near the main protest areas in Kiev, told IPS: “Things will escalate and get worse. I am expecting weeks more violence. People are really angry and there is no away back now for either side.

“I know that all the hospitals in the country are emptying out non-essential patients and making room for the people that will be injured in these clashes. Everyone knows what is coming.”

He added that the capital had been gripped by fear. “We’re all scared for our lives. We’re afraid this is going to be a massacre.”

The killings this week have been a turning point in the protests, according to many locals, some of whom had until now a neutral stance towards the protestors.

One Kiev resident, who asked not to be named, told IPS that he had closely watched the protests and seen “violent and stupid behaviour” from both the security forces and anti-government demonstrators.

But, he said: “Whether it is 25 killed or 125 killed, it doesn’t matter. The government has crossed a line and everyone is angry.”

Western leaders have condemned the violence and called on President Yanukovych to calm the situation. The EU is considering sanctions against Ukraine. And in what appeared to be co-ordinated statements earlier this week, both Kiev and the Russian foreign ministry blamed Western powers for fomenting the confrontation.

Ukraine has strong cultural and economic ties to Russia – a sixth of the population is ethnic Russian and another sixth speaks Russian as its first language.

Apparently alarmed by the protests, and in a bid to keep Kiev within its sphere of influence, Moscow agreed late last year on a vast package of financial and economic help for Ukraine. In January the government passed a series of controversial laws, some of which were modeled on existing Russian laws, which were seen by the international community as designed solely to muzzle anti-government dissent.

The close ties between Yanukovych’s regime and the Kremlin have fuelled rumours that Russian security forces were helping the local police.

There have also been reports in western media that the current crisis could split Ukraine, with one section moving towards even closer ties with Russia and the other looking towards Europe. President Yanukovych’s largest support base is in the eastern half of the country while the West is generally seen as more pro-European and anti-Russian.

However, many local people say this scenario is unlikely as there are no clear fault lines between populations in both parts of the country.

Although opposition leaders have, since the start of the protests, held meetings with foreign heads of state and EU officials to seek support, the Yanukovych regime appears resolute against any external involvement, even in the form of independent mediation, to end the crisis.

What is clear to many, however, is that the current situation needs to be resolved as soon as possible. Vladimir Onichenko, 47, a car mechanic from Kiev, told IPS: “The only way to solve the situation is for both sides to sit down for talks mediated by an independent body.

“What is happening at the moment cannot go on. Talking on the basis of the reality of what’s going on is the only way to stop this violence and the damage to the country.”

In Russia, vodka is a killer. Credit: Pavol Stracansky/IPS.

By Pavol Stracansky
MOSCOW, Feb 15 2014 (IPS)

Sitting in the dining room of a Moscow hotel, manager Yulia Golovanova explains why she always likes to see Russians, rather than foreigners, bring guests in.

“Just watch them,” she says as eight well-dressed men sit down at a table and immediately order vodka. “They come in, order round after round of vodka and keep on drinking. When there’s a big group of them they can spend huge amounts on alcohol alone,” she tells IPS.A quarter of Russian men die before they are 55, with most deaths down to alcohol consumption.

Less than an hour later the men have each consumed at least a quarter of a litre of vodka as well as glasses of beer and wine and show no signs of stopping.

The scene – a group of men drinking large quantities of hard spirits – is far from uncommon in a country with one of the highest per capita alcohol consumption rates in the world and where alcoholic overindulgence is ingrained in the culture.

But drinking in Russia has, over the years, taken a massive toll on the country, and, left unchecked could have disastrous consequences, experts say.

Tatiana Mironova, director of the Moscow-based National Centre for Public Health Monitoring, which works to reduce alcohol abuse, tells IPS: “If nothing changes or if alcohol consumption gets worse, the negative effects of drinking, in terms of the health burden and associated social problems such as domestic violence and others, will only get worse.”

Data on drinking in Russia paints a grim picture. The Russian Health Ministry says alcohol consumption per capita is 13.5 litres – twice the global average and well above the nine-litre mark which the World Health Organisation considers dangerous.

A study by the Lancet medical magazine published last month showed that a quarter of Russian men die before they are 55, with most deaths down to alcohol consumption. In comparison, the figure in the United Kingdom is seven percent and in the United States just one percent.

Experts say that what makes Russia’s problem unique is the way people drink with a prevalence of binge drinking and a preference for spirits.

While its alcohol consumption rate is actually lower than some European states, the main drink of choice in Russia, especially among men, is vodka. And it is often drunk in binges.

The effects of the country’s problem with alcohol abuse are stark. Apart from the fact that the premature death rates contribute to Russia’s already shrinking population, the Russian government estimates that the economy loses up to 100 billion dollars per year to drinking.

Other studies have suggested that as many as three-quarters of murders are committed, and almost half of suicides occur, under the influence of alcohol. Drink also plays a role in an overwhelming number of deaths from drowning, fires and falls. Law enforcement bodies say it plays a significant role in high rates of criminality, domestic violence, sexual assault and child abuse.

“Both government and wider society are aware of the direct relationship between alcohol consumption and social problems,” says Mironova.

Sociologists often cite Russians’ propensity for heavy drinking to a need – dating back throughout the nation’s history – for people to escape from widespread poverty and repressive regimes. Its historically low price and ubiquity has also meant it has always been easily accessible to the wider population. Vodka now costs just 4.50 dollars for half a litre and that price has only recently been raised.

Heavy drinking and rampant alcoholism across the country have been well documented from tsarist times right through the communist era to today’s capitalist society.

Authorities have attempted to deal with them. As far back as 1985, then general secretary of the Soviet Union’s Communist Party Mikhail Gorbachev introduced a series of measures cutting alcohol production, restricting sales and hiking prices.

While enormously unpopular with the public, the restrictions had an immediate impact on national health. Alcohol intake in the country fell by 25 percent, as did the premature death rate.

Following the lifting of those restrictions and the break-up of the Soviet Union, drinking soared once more, and with it premature death rates.

In recent years the Kremlin has looked to cut dangerous alcohol consumption once more, and a series of laws restricting sale, pricing and advertising of alcohol have been brought in.

The restrictions appear to be having some success. The Lancet study shows that while the premature death rate remained very high – more than four times the Western European average – it dropped one-third since 2006 when restrictions on alcohol were first introduced. Consumption of spirits fell by the same amount in the same time.

Professor Sir Richard Peto, an epidemiologist at Oxford University in the UK and co-author of the study, tells IPS: “This illustrates that the changes introduced since 2005 have had an effect and that, with more effort, the premature death rate [from alcohol] can be reduced further. It is not impossible.”

Experts agree that raising prices is crucial to any further success while controls on advertising and sales need to be strictly maintained or tightened even further.

But that alone will not be enough, they say.

“What is needed is not only measures to limit the marketing and sale of alcoholic products, but also active efforts to reduce the demand for alcoholic products. There need to be preventive and educational measures among people as well as prevention of alcohol abuse in the workplace and in primary health care,” Mironova says.

The government seems committed to improving the health of the nation. Besides the vodka restrictions it has recently banned smoking in public places and put restrictions on tobacco advertising and sales.

Health ministry plans envisage further rises in vodka prices up until at least next year. The ministry says it wants to see annual consumption of spirits reduced to eight litres per person.

How successful that will be in a country where many locals readily admit that massive consumption of spirits is an integral part of their culture is hard to predict.

At her restaurant, Golovanova quietly watches the businessmen order more shots of vodka. “Drinking causes so many problems in Russia, but many Russians just don’t see drinking heavily as a problem,” she tells IPS. “They see it as something completely normal.”

A social worker providing clean syringes to injection drug users in Dnipropetrovsk in eastern Ukraine. Credit: International HIV/AIDS Alliance Ukraine.

By Pavol Stracansky
KIEV, Jan 25 2014 (IPS)

Groups battling one of the world’s worst HIV/AIDS epidemics say their task may get “catastrophically” harder following the introduction of controversial laws in Ukraine in response to months of anti-government protests.

Among legislation introduced this week – dubbed a “charter for oppression” by some international rights groups – is a new law forcing NGOs that receive foreign funding to register as “foreign agents” or face hefty fines and closure.For many years Ukraine has had one of the world’s fastest growing HIV/AIDS epidemics.

Copied almost exactly from similar legislation introduced recently in Russia, the law not only puts a label with derogatory Cold War connotations on civil society groups, but, crucially for many, also forces them to pay tax on foreign income.

For organisations in the front line of response to the country’s raging HIV/AIDS epidemic, this could spell disaster.

Pavel Skala, a senior policy manager at the International HIV/AIDS Alliance in Ukraine, the largest NGO in the country working on tackling the disease, told IPS: “The new law will be catastrophic for local NGOs, making things harder for organisations working with HIV/AIDS sufferers and providing harm reduction services. The HIV/AIDS epidemic in Ukraine would only get worse.”

For many years Ukraine has had one of the world’s fastest-growing HIV/AIDS epidemics, according to United Nations figures, and currently has the highest rate of HIV infection in Europe.

Successive governments have been criticised over their approach to the disease. Local and international health groups have highlighted poor and muddled policy and inadequate funding while there have also been accusations of corruption and incompetence leading to shortages of life-saving anti-retroviral drugs.

According to UNAIDS, the Joint U.N. Programme on HIV/AIDS, less than 40 percent of people with HIV in Ukraine receive anti-retroviral drugs. For comparison, the rate in some sub-Saharan African countries is around 80 percent.

Meanwhile, despite the epidemic having been historically driven by injection drug use – there are an estimated 290,000 injecting drug users in the East European state – authorities have been either hostile to, or reluctant to adopt, harm reduction practices that have been hailed a success in helping halt the spread of HIV/AIDS in many Western states.

The government’s approach to the disease has already had consequences for how its spread is tackled. When it was discovered that the government in 2004 had paid more than 25 times the market price for anti-retroviral drugs, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria started to channel much of its funding to civil society groups.

This has led to the front line response to HIV/AIDS among high-risk groups such as drug addicts and sex workers being taken up by third sector groups.

These organisations have focused on prevention programmes, including harm prevention.

These services already seem to have had some success. In 2012, for the first time, the rate of new HIV infections in Ukraine dropped. This was put down to the widespread implementation of harm reduction programmes.

But provision of these services may now be at risk.

Under current national legislation, Global Fund financing is exempt from any taxation. But there are doubts that this will continue to be the case following the introduction of the new “foreign agent” law.

The International HIV/AIDS Alliance Ukraine implements the largest HIV prevention programme in the Eastern Europe and Central Asia region, supporting 170,000 drug users in more than 300 cities through its own services and those of more than 170 partner organisations across the country it helps finance.

The organisation is registered as a charity and, as such, should be free of any tax on its own funding from the Global Fund. But many of its partners, which are sub-recipients of that money, are civil society groups and will be forced to register as foreign agents.

The International HIV/AIDS Alliance Ukraine has told IPS that under the new laws it will not be able to pass on Global Fund financing to its local partners as the subsequent taxes would force them to close.

UNAIDS country coordinator for Ukraine, Jacek Tyszko, told IPS: “We are very concerned about this [new legislation]. It is potentially a very negative development for the situation in the country because so much of the HIV/AIDS response is carried out by civil society in the Ukraine.

“The problem is that …money from the Global Fund should be tax free but the law is unclear and so there is now doubt. We have spoken to partners in the Ukrainian Health Ministry and they are all of the opinion that the Global Fund money will still be tax free. But they are not the only ones involved.”

Since September last year, the International HIV/AIDS Alliance in Ukraine has been battling tax and customs officials over duties it claims authorities are wrongly trying to impose on its import of syringes. It argues that it should be exempt under laws related to Global Fund financing and its activities as a specific healthcare provider.

As the dispute has dragged on, millions of syringes remain impounded and have to be stored at a special facility at the Alliance’s cost.

This does not bode well for certain state bodies’ approach to the group under the foreign agent law.

“There have already been problems with the tax authorities over taxes for the import of syringes and it looks like the Ukrainian tax authorities are unwilling to make any exceptions. Now we fear there may be further problems with this [Global Fund money],” said Tyszko.

But even if civil society groups working on the front line of the HIV/AIDS response in Ukraine find some way to carry on without vital foreign funding, the new law will still hinder their work, said Skala.

He told IPS: “Organisations will be marked out as foreign agents, seen as spies, and the legislation will give law, tax and other government authorities the opportunity to carry out checks on these organisations when they want and try and change what they do.

“Social workers may be targeted by authorities, there will be a hostile atmosphere for them to work in, and people at these organisations will be afraid. Everything would be harder for them.”

This appears to be the case already. The International HIV/AIDS Alliance Ukraine told IPS its partners are already worried, with at least one having been contacted by the state security service and questioned about their funding.

Just hours after Ukrainian investigative journalist Tetyana Chornovil was beaten and left for dead last month at the side of the road by men she claims were acting on the orders of the country’s president, pictures of her battered and bruised face quickly made their way around the world.

News of the attack was used by critics of the country’s authoritarian regime as an example of the dangers faced by journalists who fall foul of the Ukrainian ruling elite.

But while what happened to her drew global media attention and was seized upon by opponents as an example of the government’s sanctioning of the brutal repression of a free press, it was just the latest episode in an ongoing crackdown on the independence of the country’s media.“For a long time we have seen a trend of independent media disappearing in Ukraine."

As well as physical intimidation of individuals, the government has been tightening its grip on the media through buy-outs of publishing houses and other media outlets.

And press watchdogs are warning that by 2015, the year of the next presidential elections, there could be virtually no independent media left.

Johann Bihr, head of the Eastern Europe and Central Asia Bureau at Reporters Without Borders, told IPS: “For a long time we have seen a trend of independent media disappearing in Ukraine, and it is perfectly possible that in just a few years there will be no independent media in the country.”

Ukraine’s media freedom has been steadily eroded in recent years, according to international media watchdogs. Ukraine languishes in 126th place out of 179 in Reporters Without Borders’s 2013 press freedom index. Just four years ago it was ranked 89th.

The most ostensibly visible threat to media freedom has been the increasing problem of violence against journalists. According to the Ukrainian NGO the Institute of Mass Information (IMI), 101 journalists were victims of physical attacks during their work in 2013. Of those, 64 were injured in assaults by police officers. The figure in 2012 was just eight.

Half of the attacks came during the recent Euromaidan protests, as the protests against the government are called. Riot police clashed with protestors, but other incidents have included the beating of reporters from a TV station covering a demonstration in the capital earlier this month who clearly identified themselves as journalists.

A high-profile case was that of Oleg Bogdanov, a journalist with the Internet-based newspaper Dorozhnyi Kontrol (Road Control) that reports on alleged corruption among traffic police. He was beaten and left with serious injuries after an attack near his home in July last year.

The level of violence against journalists in the country is shocking, even for organisations used to monitoring such abuses.

Bihr told IPS: “The recent beatings are just the tip of the iceberg. This is something which has been getting worse for years. Ukraine is not a dictatorship and the current situation there cannot be compared to, say, somewhere like Uzbekistan, or some war-torn African country.

“But having said that, the fact that it is at peace, not war, and that it is not a dictatorship makes it very unusual that there is so much violence against journalists.”

Within Europe, only Turkey reported more beatings of journalists than Ukraine last year, according to Reporters Without Borders.

When contacted by IPS, many local journalists either declined or were reticent to speak openly about the threat of violence faced by people working in their profession.

However, Yulia Sidorova, a journalist working for a newspaper in Donetsk, one of Ukraine’s largest cities, told IPS of the concern and growing paranoia among some of her colleagues about the threat of violence.

“Of course, there is pressure and repression over here… but [regarding violence against journalists] even if a journalist has an accident, many of their colleagues believe it was not an accident but because of the work they are doing,” she said.

“And conversely, those that are really victims of an attack because of their work may think that they have just had an accident. The problem is that it is so difficult to know what the truth is.”

But violence against journalists is far from the only threat to Ukraine’s media freedom. The last few years has seen media houses and broadcasting organisations bought up by people seen as close to members of the ruling elite – with consequences for editorial freedom in newspapers, other publications and broadcast media.

In one recent example, 14 journalists resigned from the Ukrainian edition of Forbes magazine in November over claims of censorship. The publication had recently been bought by Sergey Kurchenko, a businessman seen as having close ties to the family of President Viktor Yanukovych.

The country’s growing Internet media is also suffering, with numerous online news sites and websites of print publications regularly reporting cyber attacks. Some have involved sites being completely taken over and replaced with duplicates spreading false information.

Others have also been taken offline at specific times. During the recent anti-government Euromaidan protests the offices of three independent media outlets were raided by police. At the same time, the servers of some major national newspapers were shut down due to apparent cyber attacks, meaning there was a delay before news of the raids could be reported.

“Cyber attacks are a worrying practice that is on the rise,” Bihr told IPS. “Of course, because of their nature it is always hard to prove exactly who is behind them, but the attacks have always been on journalists supporting the opposition or who are independent.”

However, as bleak as the outlook may appear, there is some hope that independence in Ukraine’s media will not disappear completely.

Sidorova told IPS that despite the problems journalists face doing their jobs, criticism of the government in the media will continue.

She said: “Articles that are sharply critical of the government are published in media without any consequences and the journalists writing those articles have been doing so for many years. Therefore, they cannot see the risks to their health or their livelihoods as so great that it would keep them from publishing these articles.”

The Kremlin’s pardons have been seen as a public relations exercise ahead of the Winter Olympics. Credit: Pavol Stracansky/IPS.

By Pavol Stracansky
MOSCOW, Dec 22 2013 (IPS)

An amnesty freeing high-profile detainees and convicts and the pardoning of arguably Russia’s most famous political prisoner have failed to move critics of the country’s appalling human rights record.

To mark the 20th anniversary of Russia’s constitution, lawmakers this week approved a wide-ranging amnesty for thousands of prisoners.

The amnesty applies to, among others, the Arctic 30 – the 30 Greenpeace protestors held for months after boarding a Russian oil rig on spurious charges of hooliganism – and two members of the Pussy Riot punk rock group serving a two-year jail sentence after performing a protest song against President Vladimir Putin in a Moscow cathedral.In Russia itself some local media and analysts have linked the Games to the amnesty and Khodorkovsky’s pardon.

And on Thursday President Putin made a shock announcement that he would soon be pardoning Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the former oil baron who has spent more than ten years in jail after what critics say was a politically motivated judicial process which saw him tried twice for economic crimes.

But the wave of judicial clemency is no sign of an impending improvement in the country’s poor human rights record, say critics.

Rachel Denber, deputy director of Human Rights Watch’s Europe and Central Asia Division, told IPS: “Amnesties don’t correct the way the authorities have abused the justice system to punish political opponents and intimidate potential critics. The amnesty does not change anyone’s notion of how the Russian government views human rights.”

Since Vladimir Putin’s return to the presidency last year, international and local organisations say there has been an unprecedented crackdown on rights and freedoms, some of which has prompted outrage among the international community.

Recent legislation forcing foreign-linked NGOs to declare themselves ‘foreign agents’ or face effective closure and possible criminal prosecution and a law banning the promotion of homosexuality have attracted the ire of both foreign governments and international rights groups.

The arrests of the Arctic 30 were met with widespread outrage and the jailing of Pussy Riot members Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina – both young mothers – has been repeatedly condemned by the international community.

Meanwhile, the continued incarceration of Khodorkovsky met with continued calls from international rights to have him freed and remained a prominent blot on Russia’s already poor rights record, serving as a reminder of the regime’s treatment of political opponents and what can happen to people who do not toe the Kremlin’s line.

These and other rights abuses have come increasingly into focus as the country prepares to stage the Winter Olympics in February.

Heads of state from a number of Western nations have already said they will not be attending the Games in the Black Sea resort of Sochi. While not all have said so directly, their non-attendance has been seen as a protest over the apparent active suppression of human rights in the country.

The release of the Arctic 30 and Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina under the amnesty has suggested to some that the move has more to do with creating good PR for President Putin’s regime ahead of the Olympics than a sudden Kremlin u-turn on rights.

Denis Krivosheev, Deputy Programme Director of Amnesty International’s Europe and Central Asia Programme, told IPS: “The Russian authorities are certainly in the spotlight of much international criticism over Russia’s worsening human rights record.

“While it is not for us to say what exactly motivated the Russian authorities to adopt this amnesty law, it would indeed appear not unrelated to the growing criticism ahead of the Games.”

In Russia itself some local media and analysts have linked the Games to the amnesty and Khodorkovsky’s pardon.

Under the headline ‘Mikhail Khodorkovsky got an Olympic ticket’, political analyst for news website RBCDaily.ru, Lilit Gevorgian, said: “The pardon for Khodorkovsky is in conjunction with the amnesty. Together with financial assistance to Ukraine, this has a positive impact on Russia’s image.

“This is especially important on the eve of the Winter Olympics in Sochi in which Russia invested a lot of money.”

President Putin has denied any ulterior motive to the amnesty. Speaking at an annual press conference in Moscow on Dec. 19 he said that the arrests of the Greenpeace protestors should “serve as a warning” to anyone else attempting similar action and emphasised the amnesty was “not a revision of the court decision” to jail the Pussy Riot members.

He also made clear that his pardon of Khodorkovsky would be on compassionate grounds.

Activists say the amnesty and pardons are not enough though. Lydia Aroyo, press officer for Europe and Central Asia at Amnesty International, told IPS: “Khodorkovsky’s potential pardon is not the same as releasing him unconditionally. The charges are not written off. It does not put straight the record – Khodorkovsky’s trial was politically motivated and unfair.”

And Ben Ayliffe, head of Greenpeace’s Arctic oil campaign, told IPS: “While there is relief that the Arctic 30 are being freed we are not popping open the champagne corks in celebration. They should never have been arrested and detained in the first place. The charges against them were a fantasy.”

Even with the amnesty and apparent Khodorkovsky pardon, there are no signs that the Kremlin crackdown on NGOs and activists is going to ease up.

Just this week the promiment St. Petersburg-based anti-racism group Anti-Discrimination Centre Memorial was told by a court that it had to register as a foreign agent.

Meanwhile, activists promoting minority rights in the Krasnodar region, where Sochi is located had their homes searched and computers and mobile phones taken from them by police. Some of them had spoken out about abuses connected to the Games.

Also, many of the Bolotnaya 27 – arrested after street protests last year against President Putin on Bolotnaya Square in Moscow and now facing 13 years in jail for mass rioting and violence against public officials despite little evidence against them – remain behind bars as their trials continue.

The detention of the Bolotnaya protestors in particular is symptomatic of Russian authorities’ approach to human rights, say activists.

Amnesty’s Krivosheev told IPS: “The failure to immediately and unconditionally release them, along with other prisoners of conscience, signifies the authorities’ continuing disregard for basic human rights.”

The Kremlin is tightening its grip on media. Credit: Pavol Stracansky/IPS.

By Pavol Stracansky
MOSCOW, Dec 14 2013 (IPS)

Russia is set to lose one of its few relatively objective news outlets as the Kremlin moves to tighten its grip on the country’s media.

In an unexpected move earlier this week President Vladimir Putin ordered the closure of the RIA Novosti news agency and the creation of a new global news agency – Rossia Segodnya – to be run by one of the most pro-government figures in the media.

The Kremlin said the decision was taken for financial reasons.

But critics say the development means that the new station will almost certainly become just a tool for government propaganda.

Tatiana Gomozova, a journalist and political analyst with Kommersant FM radio station, told IPS: “It’s another media outlet being turned into a propaganda bureau with all RIA’s facilities now to be used for propaganda.”“It’s another media outlet being turned into a propaganda bureau."

Although state-owned, RIA Novosti was seen as one of Russia’s most objective news services in a media landscape which is heavily regulated and largely under government control.

Almost all the country’s TV channels are controlled by the state, while most regional newspapers are, mainly because of financial ties, in the hands of local authorities.

Among national newspapers there is some degree of independent and critical reporting on various issues.

Johann Bihr, head of the Eastern Europe and Central Asia Bureau at Reporters Without Borders, told IPS: “The national press is slightly different in that it is probably the most critical of the government – i.e. some criticism can be found there at least, and certainly among some of the online news outlets.”

But individual journalists also face problems doing their work. While self-censorship is a problem among journalists – although Reporters Without Borders says that this practice has been waning in recent years – independent journalists reporting critically on the state, especially in areas such as human rights, can often find themselves facing intimidation, or worse.

According to the Vienna-based International Press Institute (IPI), 62 journalists have been killed in Russia since 1997, making it the sixth deadliest country in the world for reporters in the last 16 years. But the group also warns that the real figure could be higher as impunity for attacks on journalists in Russia remains the general rule and the vast majority of cases go unsolved.

In an interview with the IPI earlier this year, Novaya Gazeta investigative reporter Elena Milashina explained the problems faced by some journalists in Russia.

She said: “I think there was a kind of political order or demand in the country when Putin came to power the first time; he kind of announced a war on free media….When such attacks on journalists happen, journalists go to the police and the police don’t want to investigate. When they have to do so, because of a murder, they do it slowly because no one is pushing. Impunity is the rule and they understand that nothing will happen to them if they don’t investigate.

“Behind murders, a high-level politician stands in almost all cases. Investigators understand that if they are digging around, they will have problems. When people try to criticise the regime – not just journalists, but human rights defenders too – at a high level they try to show that it’s not safe to do so, and that they [politicians] can get away with anything.”

The authorities’ iron grip on the media is highlighted by the fact that Russia currently ranks 148th in Reporters Without Borders’ Freedom of the Press Index. This puts it below countries such as Libya, Angola and Afghanistan.

The appointment of one of its most fervent supporters to the top position in the Rossia Segodnya agency suggests state control is not being relaxed in any way.

Dmitri Kiselyov is a TV host who is well-known for his pro-government and ultra-conservative views. He has previously praised Stalinist policies and recently called for the hearts of homosexuals to be burned when they die.

Speaking on state-owned TV channel Russia 24 just hours after his appointment he outlined the aims for Rossia Segodnya as “restoring a fair attitude towards Russia, an important country in the world that has good intentions, is the mission of the new organisation.”

And it is his appointment, directly by Putin, as head of the news agency that is a more worrying signal of the government’s intent towards the country’s media than the liquidation of a relatively objective news outlet, say experts.

Gomozova told IPS: “There’s not much media freedom in Russia already, so losing RIA won’t mean we’ve lost that much. But this is a very strong signal for journalists – nobody is safe now.

“The government doesn’t care even about its own media. They don’t respect any media with a story, nor its team, nor that team’s job. They need a resource so they just go and get it.”

Bihr added: “It sounds ominous for the future that Kiselyov has been made head of the new organisation, and the fact that its head has been appointed by the president directly says a lot about its possible future policy.”

As anti-government protests in the Ukraine move into their third week, there are growing concerns among individuals and civil society organisations in the country over the regime’s approach to protestors.

Rights groups say that there are already similarities to the sinister crackdown on individual rights and freedoms that were seen in Belarus following the bloody end to protests there after presidential elections at the end of 2010.

They say students are being targeted by police and prosecutors, and some have been afraid to go to school for fear they could be expelled and cut off from the education system for taking part in protests.“While it is early days there are some disturbing similarities emerging between what happened in Belarus and what happened in the Ukraine.”

Meanwhile, the arrests of ten people so far, with more expected, on apparently fabricated cases of involvement in mass civil disturbances, and their controversial pre-trial incarceration, has given rise to worries that the regime will use them as an example to deter other protestors.

“While it is early days there are some disturbing similarities emerging between what happened in Belarus and what happened in the Ukraine,” Yulia Gorbunova, Ukraine researcher for Human Rights Watch, told IPS.

“The pre-trial detentions of protestors, the reported intimidation of students – these are things that happened in Belarus. We can only hope the Ukrainian regime will not take the same path as the Belarusian authorities did.”

The protests in Kiev, which began following the government’s decision not to sign an EU Association Agreement, have drawn hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians to the capital’s main square, Maidan Nezalezhnosti, and other locations in the city.

Initially passing off peacefully, a brutal police crackdown on Nov. 30, which saw riot police indiscriminately attack hundreds of people, beating them and leaving some in hospital, changed the tone of the protests.

Arrests of protestors on charges of taking part in “mass disturbances” came soon after. Lawyers for those arrested, their relatives and local activists have publicly questioned the evidence used to bring the charges against them.

Their pre-trial detention has also been questioned by international rights groups.

Heather McGill, researcher for Ukraine at Amnesty International, told IPS: “These were people taking part in a peaceful demonstration but who have been arrested for taking part in ‘mass disorder’. They were immediately sent to prison to be held in pre-trial detention, despite legal regulations clearly stating that this should only happen in exceptional circumstances.

“They could face a maximum eight-year jail sentence. And things do not look good for them with there being, on average, in the Ukraine, a one percent chance of acquittal once charges are bought.

“We could soon be seeing prisoners of conscience in the Ukraine, which would be a huge step backwards.”

Meanwhile, there have been growing reports of student protestors being targeted by law enforcement agencies.

Some have received anonymous threatening phone calls while prosecutors have allegedly asked universities for lists of student attendance on protest days.

The interior ministry has said there is no truth in the reports while police officials have claimed that they are only arresting ‘troublemakers’.  

With more arrests and detentions expected in the coming weeks, combined with the threats to students, the regime appears to be using similar methods to those used by Belarusian authorities in the aftermath of mass protests following the re-election of autocratic president Alexander Lukashenko three years ago.

In the weeks after the protests in Minsk were brutally ended by police, hundreds of people were arrested and jailed for taking part in them. Meanwhile, students were also singled out by police as protestors and thrown out of universities and denied any further education. There was also a dramatic crackdown on civil society groups in the country, many of whom were accused of helping foment the protests.

“We can only hope that the Ukrainian authorities respect the right to freedom of assembly,” said Gorbunova.

But the authorities’ targeting of protestors appears likely to simply strengthen their resolve. Many locals in Kiev say they view the protests as being as much against the regime’s treatment of protestors and the police crackdown at the end of November as about the government’s refusal to sign an agreement with the EU.

Kiev resident Marina Kovalenko, 26, told IPS: “Many protestors are refusing to go home until there is a full investigation into the police and who did what to the protestors, and why their son, or brother, or friend was beaten up or had their bones broken. They want to see someone held to account for it.”

So far Interior Minister Vitaliy Zakharchenko has rejected calls for his resignation over the police crackdown, although an investigation has been promised.

Garbage in Ahshtyrskaya near Sochi. Credit: Environmental Watch on North Caucasus.

By Pavol Stracansky
MOSCOW, Nov 11 2013 (IPS)

Despite an endorsement from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) for their adherence to environmental standards in preparations for next year’s Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russian authorities are cracking down harder and harder on people trying to expose the environmental cost of projects related to the Games.

Local environmental activists have for years been warning of what they claim is serious damage being done to Black Sea beaches as well as the Sochi National Park and the Caucasus national nature reserve near the city.

But as the Olympics get closer and preparations for the games advance, they say they are facing growing harassment, including intimidation, wiretapping, arrests and, possibly, attempts on their life, by authorities desperate to avoid environmental scandals after making a “Zero Waste” pledge for the Games.

“The harassment is increasing,” Andrey Petrov, World Heritage Campaign Coordinator at Greenpeace Russia told IPS. “Organisations and the people working for them are facing pressure.”“The harassment is increasing. Organisations and the people working for them are facing pressure.”

One group in particular, the Environmental Watch on North Caucasus (EWNC) appears to have become the authorities’ prime target.

Two of its members, Evgeny Vitishko and Andrey Rudomakha have been detained by local police, both for what the group claims are spurious reasons. Both, later released, believe they were followed and probably wiretapped by police before being picked up by officers.

But there have been even more disturbing incidents. EWNC activist Vladimir Kimayev recently ended up in hospital after a traffic accident when the brakes on his moped failed to work.

He told local media that he suspects they had been tampered with.

Rudomakha, head of the EWNC, told IPS: ”Of course, the reprisals we have faced come from the concerns of the authorities that we will continue to expose lawlessness in the preparations for the Olympics.”

The intimidation comes as authorities face serious questions over the environmental impact of the Games.

Billed by the hosts as the cleanest Olympics ever, the government has pledged the Games – to be held between Feb. 7 and 21 next year – will be ‘zero waste’.

But it has been revealed that the state-owned rail monopoly has been dumping tons of waste into an illegal landfill just north of Sochi, posing a contamination risk to local water sources.

The news was an embarrassment to local and federal authorities as it came during the International Olympic Committee (IOC) Conference on Sport and the Environment being held in Sochi.

At the event – which the EWNC and Greenpeace Russia were not invited to and which the WWF boycotted because of its criticism of the authorities’ approach to the environmental impact of the Games – IOC officials had given a ringing endorsement to the Games’ organisers, saying they had met environmental standards in their preparations for the Games.

But following the revelations about the landfill, some IOC members called for a full investigation. The IOC did not respond when contacted by IPS, but in a previous statement it said that local authorities were responsible for dealing with the illegal landfill.

Russia’s Environmental Protection Agency, which issued a report months ago identifying the use of the illegal landfill, said that it had not ordered the dump closed but that Russian Railways had been fined 3,000 dollars. The project it is working on – a 30-mile road and rail link between Games venues – has so far cost 8.5 billion dollars.

The company blamed the landfill on a subcontractor and last week said that the subcontractor had dealt with the problem. This came despite trucks being seen to be still dumping tons of waste in the landfill.

Residents in and around Sochi say that there are numerous other smaller dumps which have cropped up in the area, and point to the fact that since the Russian Railways project began wells near the village housing the illegal landfill site have dried up. Locals are forced to get their water from cisterns which are brought in once a week.

The problem with the illegal landfill is just one of many that environmental groups have said the Games have caused.

These include the destruction of thousands of hectares of rare forests, spawning sites for endangered fish, hibernation sites and migration routes for animals. They have also pointed to the fact that low quality projects which did not take into account local weather conditions had already led to some deaths as storms washed away sites under construction.

The government has denied any serious environmental problems connected to the Games and maintains it is meeting its environmental commitments.

But critics point out that the government has already backslid on promises to keep the Games as clean as possible. Its 51 billion dollar budget for the Games – the largest in Olympic history – has no provisions for dealing with construction waste.

Legislation has also been repeatedly amended to help Games preparation – at the expense of the environment.

Then Prime Minister Vladimir Putin last year cancelled waste legislation from Games preparation plans, including construction of recycling facilities. This meant that Sochi authorities were free to do what they wanted with waste and soon after abandoned plans for recycling in favour of burning non-separated rubbish.

Prior to this, between 2006 and 2009, environmental conservation legislation was changed, allowing for sports events to be held in national parks and rare species of trees and plants to be destroyed for Olympic construction.

Authorities seem determined to ensure that the Games will go ahead with as little bad publicity over their environmental impact as ever and have already introduced legislation to ensure there will be no protests in the run-up and during the Olympics.

Mass meetings of any kind have been banned in most of the area in and around Sochi from Jan. 7 until Mar. 21 next year.

However, the environment has already been scarred, activists say, and the effects will be felt long after the Games end.

Greenpeace’s Petrov told IPS: “Apart from everything that has already been destroyed, there is a serious threat that after the Olympics many buildings will no longer be used and will start to fall apart and decay. This would lead to catastrophes over much wider areas than just those that have been built on.”