Nashi’s Anti-Brenton Campaign

By Sean at 9 December, 2006, 10:45 pm

It looks like Nashi is up to its tricks again. According to news reports, Anthony Brenton, the British Ambassador to Russia, has filed a formal complaint to the Russian Foreign Ministry, claiming that Nashi members have been “psychologically harassing” him. Nashi’s harassment of Brenton is not directly linked to the Litvinenko murder per se, though the incident has certainly heightened political tensions between Russian and British officials, but the fact that he has emerged as a harsh critic of Russia’s human rights record. “It is a deliberate psychological harassment which is done professionally and which borders on violence,” says Mr Brenton. He also claims that Nashi’s activities could not be without Kremlin sanction.

Whether Nashi is being directed by the Kremlin to harass Brenton is immaterial. There is nothing to suggest that they can’t organize and execute such campaigns on their own. In fact, I would gather that the anti-Brenton campaign is by their own initiative; initiative that the Kremlin isn’t going to simply shun. Kremlin officials, especially Putin’s chief architect of ideology, Vladislav Surkov, meet regularly with Nashi, making Moscow’s endorsement of the movement is unmistakable. And Nashi activists know this and see it as an implicit mandate for their activities. Nashi has become one of the populist means to intimidate those it has deemed enemies of Russia and Putin. Welcome to the Komsomol reincarnate.

The Telegraph reports:

 

For nearly five months, Nashi activists have picketed both the British embassy and Mr Brenton’s residence, heckled virtually every speech he has given, followed his car and even posted details of his itinerary on their website — a move that has raised fears for the ambassador’s security.

Mr Brenton’s woes began in July, shortly before Russia hosted its first ever G8 summit, when he addressed an opposition conference despite Kremlin warnings that his presence would be viewed as “an unfriendly gesture”. Though the speech itself was fairly anodyne, Mr Brenton was the only western diplomat to speak at the “Alternative Russia” gathering, a gesture that incensed Mr Putin.

The president accused the ambassador of seeking “to influence the internal balance of power in Russia”.

Nashi’s campaign began shortly afterwards. Last night a spokesman for the British embassy said that the ambassador had received assurances that the matter would be dealt with.

It seems inconceivable that Nashi could be acting without the tolerance of the Kremlin. Although it denied harassing the ambassador, Nashi has pledged to continue its campaign until Mr Brenton apologizes for attending the “Alternative Russia” summit.

 

The most recent harassment of Brenton occurred at Moscow’s Humanities University where Nashi members heckled him with “Brenton, apologize!” as he stood next to British playwright Tom Stoppard, who is Moscow to promote his play about Russian 19th century intellectuals. This was followed by another incident in Samara. After a meeting with the governor of Samara, Brenton was confronted by about 25 Nashi activists led by Tikhon Chumakov and Aleksei Flora. According to the youth organization’s website,

 

After [Brenton] noticed the Nashi commissars, he immediately entered the building of Britain Council of Samara. He pointed his finger at Aleksei Flora, and after standing confused for a few seconds, turned and went away with his companion. The commissars could not simply forgive of the ambassador’s sympathy for fascists and went after him shouting “Brenton is a coward!” and “Brenton, apologize!”

The ambassador could only get away from Nashi only by car. That evening Anthony Brenton left Samara.

 

There is even a video of the incident.

Brenton is lucky to simply be a victim of heckling and “psychological harassment.” He could after all be subject to the tactics they use against rival youth organizations. As Mark Grueter wrote about Nashi in May this year:

 

Either way, one might take a bit of solace in realizing that a government which feels a need to establish street-thug organizations in order to defend itself reveals not strength but weakness. The Tsar was inept and desperate and his repressive attempts at counter-revolution, his support for the Black Hundreds, only led to civil war and his eventual blood-soaked overthrow. Where will Putin’s counter-reforms lead us?

What is worrisome about the Nashists, however, is their alleged connection to the country’s burgeoning neo-Nazi skinhead population. Jake Rudnitsky of the eXile reported the following in February: “It’s an open secret that Nashi security, at least at its Moscow events, is provided by Spartak football hooligans with ties to racist skinheads.” I’m also told that United Russia (Putin’s political party and practically the only party in the country) in Vladivostok openly collaborates with neo-Nazis to defend its interests on the streets. Putin is a shrewd politician, preaching anti-fascism on one hand (indeed the Nashi outfit is sold to the public as an antifascist one) while simultaneously employing xenophobic rhetoric himself. Rudnitsky concludes his piece on skinheads, “If anything, they’re [Kremlin operatives] interested in co-opting the fascists and turning them into a politically useful tool in case of a threat from an Orange — or a National-Bolsheviks — revolution.” But there is no real threat, not now anyway. And further study is needed on just how closely Nashists and Nazis (to the extent that there’s a difference) are indeed colluding.

 

“Colored Revolution” looks as bleak as it did earlier this year, but the wonderful thing about enemies is that they can easily be found elsewhere. It seems that Nashi has found there’s in Mr. Brenton, who has become their current symbol for anti-Russian and anti-Putin forces.

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Comments
Aleksandr NVK December 10, 2006

So Brenton wants to be free to criticize others but does not want others to return the favor to him. Looks to me like just more of typical western double standards- besides although I have no doubts that Kremlin could tell Nashi to find another hobby problem with this is that silencing a political group because someone does not like the message is not something that a free democratic country would do now is it?
Let Brenton have his say and let Nashi have theirs- this is the way it should work. If Brenton objects to this then maybe it is his own principals he should be examining before criticizing others. Just a thought…

Michael Averko December 10, 2006

IMO, the Black Hundreds-Naschi connection is a bit of a stretch.

Unless of course one wants to say that Reagan had neo-Nazi connections to the same degree. That some bigots suppported Reagan and that some bigots support Putin doesn’t make those two bigots or supporters of bigotry.

Jake Rudnitsky has quite a way with measuring extreme manner. Some might recall his Donetsk is fascist article glorying the so called “Orange revolution”. The former Kyiv Post editor Rudnitsky said nothing of the fascism found in the Orange stronghold of Lviv in the west Ukrainian region of Galicia.

In many Western circles, Russian political extremism gets put under the microscope when compared to the arguably greater extremisms (pound for pound) found in other parts of the former Communist Europe.

I don’t want to make divisively misguided generalizations like some. Collectively, I don’t find Russians to be as bigoted as some others in that part of the world. Again, keeping in mind to judge each person by themselves and not by their ethnicity.

Anonymous December 11, 2006

Agree with Aleksandr NVK – Brenton shouldn’t be surprised at this activity after speaking at places like “Alternative Russia”. When the British Ambassador to Russia (or any other high official or just person) shows unfriendliness to the country where he’s staying, it will reply to him in the same unfriendly manner. Brenton should be smarter. After all, he represents the relations between GB and the current Russian government, whether he likes it or not!

Anonymous December 11, 2006

So Aleksandr nvk, if it’s just a thought maybe you should think a little bit harder the next time – and then maybe be able to see the difference between giving a critical speech and heckling/harrasing/yelling. In a democracy people don’t answer criticizem with screaming – so yes by all means let Nashi have their “say”, but not their stupid yelling.

And this goes for anonymous as well, yes let them reply in the same unfriendly manner – which as far as I have understod would be through a speech containing arguments and just possibly some critical viewpoints, thats how it’s supossed to be done in a free society. We engage our opponents we dont just show up and yell at them. And untill you understand that, please don’t talk about double standards and how things a supposed to be done “in a free democratic country”.

Al the best
Frederik

Oh and by the way, my first post on this blog, so just wanna add i like the perspective it gives and the thoughtfull and wellwritten style of the posts

Oh and please excuse my lousy english

johnnie b. baker December 11, 2006

how is attendance to something like ‘alternative russia’ showing unfriendliness to russia? that i don’t understand. talking to people outside of the officially sanctioned political structures, thus perhaps helping to create a more open dialgie within russia, shows a respect for the russian people, outside of the tightly controlled kremlin line, which claims that any criticism of the government’s policies seems equal to treason.

f. kriukov December 11, 2006

“Other Russia” was not made up of genuine (“system”) opposition. It was made up of extremists on both ends of the spectrum, who favor overturning the system (i.e., a revolution). A foreign country supporting revolutionary forces in another country most certainly constitutes a hostile act.

Frederik: you should also think harder when you post. It is an inalienable part of democracy to express your dissenting opinion by staging pickets, rallies and chanting silly slogans. The British ambassador (and you too) should learn to deal with Russian democracy, rather than make inane accusations about “professional” psychological pressure. How pathetic can one get to imply that his opposition is controlled by some sinister and clandestine organizations?

Cyrill December 11, 2006

>>How pathetic can one get to imply that his opposition is controlled by some sinister and clandestine organizations?

Isn’t it exacty what Russians and Russian authorities claim very often?

f. kriukov December 11, 2006

Isn’t it exacty what Russians and Russian authorities claim very often? — there are 142 mln Russians. So Russians “very often” claim absolutely anything and everything. Same as any other large pool of people. As for the Russian authorities, being an absolutely evil organization bent on destroying the world, they often imply that much of the “liberal” opposition is financed from abroad. Which just happens to be exactly true. And is not equivalent to claiming that the “opposition is controlled by some sinister and clandestine organizations”.

Have you heard the one about “? ? ??? ?????? ???????!”? :)

Cyrill December 11, 2006

>>Which just happens to be exactly true. And is not equivalent to claiming that the “opposition is controlled by some sinister and clandestine organizations”.

Then why try to curb that financial support?

>>Have you heard the one about “? ? ??? ?????? ???????!”? :)

Of course, ??? ???? ?? ??????? ??? ?????, ? ??? ? ?????? ??? ??-???????? :-)

Anonymous December 11, 2006

@f. kriukov

Off course you are right, one should allways think harder before posting. So now i tried thinking again

First i need to say that i’m pretty sure I didnt make any inane accusations about “professional” psychological pressure – so i guess the pathetic-thing was not aimed at me, which off course does not imply that I (together with the ambassador) should not try to learn to deal with russian democracy (i try i try – why do you think i read among diffenrent things this blog).

Second what i did try to do was to make the pretty obvious point that theres a very substantiel diffenrence between voicing a coherent critique in a speech and simply trying to keep a person from voicing critique through heckling. So yes while yelling silly slogans and staging pickets is and indeed should be an inalienable part of every decenct democracy, then trying to silence critical voices by harrasment is (or at least should not be) a part of a “decent” democracy.

(And in my very humble and subjective opinion the fact that its a youth movement trying to silence voices critical of the “system” only makes it so much more disturbing – but that might just be me that has this pathetic idea about youth movements being anti-system, anti-nationlistic)

But back to the point, theres a difference between voicing your critical opinions in a coherent manner(which could be the first part of that wonderfull thing called dialogue) and then obstructing the voicing of critical opinions not by arguments but by heckling and harrasment (which could be the first part of that not so wonderful thing callad totalitarianism).

I only tried to state these not very controversial points since at least two of the earlier comments didn’t seem to be able to see the difference.

All the best
Frederik

f. kriukov December 11, 2006

Then why try to curb that financial support? — you mean, why make them pay income tax on that financial support? Why not? Is that wrong?

Of course, ??? ???? ?? ??????? ??? ?????, ? ??? ? ?????? ??? ??-???????? :-) — FBI says there were 2,731 anti-Black hate crimes in the US in 2004 (out of 7,649 total), with 3,475 victims. ? ? ?????? ??? ??-????????: ??????, ????????, ??????? ? ??????? ?? ????????. ??-??. :)

But the real point of the joke was a hint to avoid attempts to justify the Brit’s inane accusations with cliches from internal Russian political discourse. The British ambassador is a fool, and foolishness of some Russians doesn’t justify his shortcomings. He’s an official (moreover, a diplomat) who has to watch his language, which regular people don’t have to do.

f. kriukov December 11, 2006

Well, Frederik, I hate to disappoint you, but Russian democracy is quite indecent. It’s violent, dirty, mean-spirited and often rather hysterical. C’est la vie. And even though coherent critiques are preferrable to heckling, both are quite acceptable means of people’s democratic expression. Totalitarianism is a theoretical construct of little practical significance, but authoritarianism begins when heckling of critics is done by government agents in prisons, rather than by youths who have nothing better to do with their time.

I really don’t know where you got the idea that youth movements are supposed to be anti-system or anti-nationalistic. Youth movements in reality are quite reactionary — they protest against their parents’ generation. If the parents were anti-system and anti-nationalistic (such as the situation in Russia in late 1980s-1990s), then where does it leave modern youths? Is it a surprise they tend toward patriotism or even nationalism? But don’t worry, the youth of the next decade or later will go back to the stereotype you desire.

Anonymous December 13, 2006

Dear Frederik: In a FREE society I can scream if I want to or do anything else which is not prohibited by law. If I feel like sitting down for an intelligent discussion with arguments, I can do that also. That means being POLITE, it does NOT equal to free society, like you said.
Oh, and by the way, if you or Brenton aren’t happy about “harrasment” or whatever, there’s always that good ol’ thing called COURT!

Cyrill December 13, 2006

>>? ? ?????? ??? ??-????????: ??????, ????????, ??????? ? ??????? ?? ????????. ??-??. :)

Content has changed, structure hasn’t. Oligarchs and KGB thugs replaced obkomy i genseki.

As for sausage – I spent quite a bit of time there tasting hunting for sausage. Variety is amazing; although they all taste the same:-)

FREDERIK: things like that are happening regularly on university campi in the US – speakers hackled. It is a natural state of mind of students and young people in general – shut unfamiliar or challenging speech up.

f. kriukov December 13, 2006

>>Content has changed, structure hasn’t. Oligarchs and KGB thugs replaced obkomy i genseki.

And have you heard this one:

“Did you know that Ivanov won a car in the state lottery?”

“Yeah, except it was Rabinowitz, not Ivanov, 5 rubles, not a car, poker, not lottery, and he didn’t win, he lost.”

Everything else is the same. :)

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