Daily Archives: June 23, 2006

Here’s a surprise. Moscow militsa stop non-Slavs 22 times more often than Slavic looking people. I would have never known! So says a new study reported by Fred Weir of the Christian Science Monitor.

The study, in which monitors observed more than 1,500 police document checks at 15 Metro stations over a five-month period in 2005, concluded that Moscow police are engaged in “massive ethnic profiling.” The practice is unlawful discrimination, a violation of the equal rights of citizens under the Russian Constitution and the country’s international commitments. For example, the United Nations Race Convention prohibits racial discrimination with respect to “freedom of movement,” and guarantees the “right to equal treatment” by judicial officials.

Anita Soboleva, executive director of Jurix, the lawyers’ group that conducted the survey with funds from George Soros’ Open Society Institute, says “Police ethnic profiling reflects ..read more

Discussion of the (re)emergence of a cold war between the United States and Russia has heated up over the last year. The initial warm relationship between Bush and Putin has soured. There are no more weekends at the Crawford Ranch or in Putin’s po Moskvy residence. Diverging visions of a post-Cold War world along with disagreements over each nation’s jurisdiction in Eurasia have helped cool an otherwise warm initial relationship. That coolness became a chill when Vice President Dick Cheney called Putin and Russia out as “seeking to reverse the gains of the last decade” in a speech at the Vilnius Conference in May. The upcoming G-8 Summit in St. Petersburg next month is expected to reveal just how deep the tension runs.

All of this hasn’t escaped New York University Professor Stephen Cohen in his article “The New American Cold War” in the ..read more