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| (Photo from RT) |
Monday was National Unity Day in Russia, a national holiday
created to replace the Soviet-era Revolution Day. Intended as a unifying
celebration of the multi-ethnic state, in several Russian cities it was
celebrated with ultra-nationalist marches, fascist slogans, and violence.
An annual tradition on Unity Day is the Russian March, a
parade of far-right extremists through major Russian cities. The Putin
government – which pressures city governments to refuse demonstration permits
to opposition groups – sits idly by while cities grant permits to this
hate-fest. In Moscow the police briefly detained thirty or so Marchers, but the
rest were left free to parade through Moscow carrying banners with slogans such
as “Russia for Russians” and “Today a mosque — tomorrow jihad.”
Unity Day was predictably marked by violence. In Moscow
Neo-Nazis staged the “White Car Event,” invading subway cars and assaulting immigrants.
They beat one man almost to death, a Russian citizen with the misfortune to
look like he comes from the Caucasus. Participants in the St. Petersburg
Russian March did the Moscow marchers one better – they succeeded in beating an
Uzbek man to death.
As usual, the search for thoughtful Russian reactions to the
Russian March led me to Boris Akunin. On Tuesday he wrote
regarding the rising tide of xenophobia: “In a country where people of many
nationalities live, any political program rooted in ethnic bias must lead to
pogroms, and to the threat of national collapse. Russia needs the diametrical
opposite – a common cause, an overall project, a common goal – to unite its
people and not disperse them into their separate compartments.”
Akunin despairs that no voice of reason has stepped forward
to lead opposition to the extremists who occupy the Kremlin and terrorize the
streets. Yet as he keenly observes, in a country subject to authoritarian rule
for most of its history, “Enough of us clustered around the leaders! It is time
to unite around ideas, programs and platforms.”
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