The following took place in the Tver district in February this year. In a village near Rozhdestveno, an inhabitant called Spirin committed an infringement: while driving he overtook, or “cut up”, a car belonging to a member of the local militia. Instead of following the legal code, the militiamen went to Rozhdestveno on 5 February, where many people had assembled for a school jubilee celebration. Unable to find Spirin, they then rampaged through the village’s club.

One of the injured, Yevgeny Bondarenko, related that when he and his friend drove towards the club, men wearing fatigues and masks ran towards his car, and without any warning began to beat on the door. They dragged out Bondarenko and his friend from the car, started to beat them, and hauled them off to the club. Bondarenko pleaded with the militia not to beat his legs, which had been injured in a recent accident, so they continued to beat his legs. In the club, he saw people lying on the ground, including children. If a head was raised, it would be kicked. He saw blood, even teeth, on the floor. According to Bondarenko, the divisional (militia) head said, “Now (you) locals shall know who is the divisional (head)”. On 7 February, Bondarenko submitted his statement to the local office of the public prosecutor.

When another victim, Meruzhan Avagimyan, approached the club with his wife Nasiba, militiamen in plain clothes approached them, and started to search their car. They demanded his nationality, and upon replying he was Armenian, they started behaving especially rudely. At the same time, his wife was taken to the club. One of the militia struck her, as a result of which she banged her head against a radiator and received concussion. Upon being taken out of the club, she fainted.

Valentina Katihina, mother of Roman Matrosov, an inhabitant of a neighbouring village, related how her son had lain two weeks in hospital after having been beaten by the OMON militia and receiving concussion and a head wound. On 16 February the Kalinin office of the public prosecutor opened a criminal case. The militia demanded the injured son withdraw his statement to the public prosecutor. His mother was “visited” at work by militiamen supposedly with a search warrant. One of them was a woman who, according to Katihina, had taken part in the events of 5 February.

Human rights activists noted it was impossible to identify the militia members who had attacked civilians, as they had been wearing masks.

Human rights activists also commented on events in a village called Tabori, located in the Sverdlovsk region. The man to suffer most from the militia’s conduct there was a certain Fazil Musaev. The man’s brother Nazim said the head of the local Ministry of the Interior, Alexander Veberov, had attempted to extort money and other valuables from his brother, who refused. On 23 September last year, around ten drunk members from the department to battle organised crime took away Fazil to the Tabori ministry of the interior, where he was badly beaten. As a result, the man, in shock and injured, was taken to hospital, where he remained for the following 29 days. Nazim said that three inhabitants of the area, who had complained at the militia’s behaviour, were accused of making false statements.

The local public prosecutor’s office turned down Musaev’s request to open a criminal investigation against Veberov and an investigator Dikovich, as there was “no evidence of a crime”. The decision of the local public prosecutor affirms Musaev’s injuries were received by falling from a ladder, and hitting his head against the ladder and a wall.

Another inhabitant of Tabori, Alexander Shalaev, said that on 23 September last year officers from the organised crime department approached him and said it was required to plant evidence against Musaev, of him having stolen wood. He was taken to a room and threatened. Then he was beaten, and his jaw broken. The man later said, “I know by sight those who beat me”.

The movement For Human Rights reported that at a holiday camp called Skazka, located in the Nefteyugansk region, a group of youths attacked the pensioner Nikolai Kolesnikov. Security officers intervened, and were themselves attacked. The militia soon arrived and ordered all over the age of 14 to come to the militia station.

Four security guards, Nikolai Stepanov, Vitali Fomenko, Sergei Usov and Andrei Kondrashov were beaten to force them to sign a statement with information not in accordance to the facts. Afterwards all four were taken to hospital, as they were unable to move. Kondrashev had a leg broken and tore a ligament; Usov broke several ribs. All of them had various other wounds and bruises. Although they complained to the public prosecutor, as of 7 April none of them had been questioned. The injured expect little justice in Nefteyugansk, say activists. According to some information, the hooligans were in fact officers from a militia branch.

The representative of the Helsinki Group in Moscow, Lyudmila Alekseyeva, said the militia “behaves like fascists in occupied countryside”.

Recently the group Obsheye Deystvye (General Movement) sent an open letter to the Minister of the Interior Rashid Nurgaliev, and the director of the service against narcotics Viktor Cherkesov, demanding an end to the epidemic of zachistki (so-called cleansing activities). No answer has been received.

On 12 April human rights activists appealed to President Putin to remove both Nurgaliev and Cherkesov, who, the authors of the appeal note, do not stop infringements of the law by their subordinates, but actually encourage them.

Activists understand they will be unlikely to receive an answer this time. They plan to commence a broad public campaign for the two officials to resign. But if the actions of public organisations do not affect Putin’s position, how then to proceed?