Yesterday, a Russian judge who had tried high-profile racist murder cases was shot dead in the stairwell of his home. Eduard Chuvashov had sentenced a group of ultra-nationalists, mostly teenage skinheads, to up to 23 years in jail for the murders of migrant workers from Central Asia. Chuvashov had faced threats on several radical websites, and authorities believe his killing is most likely related to the work he did. Three years ago, I went to Russia looking for the source of viral videos I had seen on the Internet showing neo-Nazi skinheads kicking and beating people in the streets with no apparent provocation. In the Vanguard documentary “From Russia With Hate,” I reported the attacks were coming almost daily in Russian cities. I was in Moscow on Hitler's birthday, April 20, and found foreign students confined to their dorms because nationalist fervor surrounding the anniversary was so high it wasn't safe for dark-skinned people to go outside. I filmed ultra nationalist politicians preaching hatred to crowds of disenfranchised youth in Moscow, and I interviewed a member of parliament who openly espoused using violence to terrify immigrants from former Soviet territories in the Caucuses and Central Asia. I also visited a secret, military-style training camp, where we watched neo-Nazis crawl through fire learning to become guerilla fighters. It was there I met the creator of many of the Internet attack videos, who proudly showed me his “propaganda films” of youth gangs setting upon and bashing nonwhites to terrorize the ethnic immigrant community. Not long after my visit, one of the leaders I interviewed was arrested and jailed, and I wondered if the Putin government was finally cracking down on the ultra-nationalists. Far from it. added by: Christof
