Putin’s ‘New People’ are the Black Hundreds of Today, Golts Says

Map of Russia and Russian Flag adapted from images at state.gov

(Paul Goble – Windows on Eurasia – Staunton, August 22, 2015) Vladimir Putin’s “new people,” the lumpen who are prepared to take the law into their own hands in the name of advancing the goals of the Kremlin leader that they think are being undermined by the bureaucracy and oligarchs, are the exact equivalent of the Black Hundreds that carried […]

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Putin Now has His Storm Troopers and Pogroms Will Surely Follow, Ganapolsky Says

Vladimir Putin

(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, January 23, 2014) Putin’s Russia has crossed a Rubicon: it now has sanctioned the Anti-Maidan Movement, a domestic version of Hitler’s storm troopers, and thus created a monster that almost certainly will engage in pogroms against one group or another in the future, according to Moscow commentator Matvey Ganapolsky. Despite Putin’s ratings […]

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In Sochi and Crimea, Cossacks Seek to Define Role in Society

Kremlin and Saint Basil's File Photo

(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – D. Garrison Golubock – April 2, 2014) Dimiter Kenarov, a freelance reporter working in Crimea, was surprised to see a group of uniformed Cossacks hastily carrying cables and video equipment out of an Associated Press television studio. When he and another photographer attempted to document the incident, they found themselves attacked and robbed at gunpoint, […]

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Russia’s New Digital Vigilantes

File Image of Stylized Eye Surrounded by Binary Code

(RFE/RL – rferl.org – Tom Balmforth – July 10, 2013) MOSCOW — It’s sort of a freelance sting operation aimed at suspected pedophiles. And it works like this: An activist logs into an Internet chat forum and poses as a minor. If an adult man shows interest and suggests inappropriate contact, he is gently warned that his interlocutor is underage. […]

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Moscow Cossack Patrol Unsanctioned -­ Officials

Kremlin and Moscow Environs Aerial View

MOSCOW, November 27 (RIA Novosti) ­ Self-proclaimed Cossacks who began patrolling central Moscow on Tuesday were not authorized to do so, despite claiming otherwise, the district administration said. A group of people styling themselves Cossacks patrolled a downtown square by the capital’s Belorussky train station on Tuesday, reports said. Eight men in furry hats and striped trousers, outnumbered five to […]

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