Boris Stomakhin - Misplaced Pages

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Boris Vladimirovich Stomakhin (Russian: Борис Владимирович Стомахин), (born August 24, 1974, Moscow), is a Russian radical political activist, journalist, and editor of political periodicals. He was sentenced to five years of prison for inciting religious and ethnic hatred, promoting violent change of constitutional regime, calls for violation of terriorial integrity of Russian Federation, defamatory statements(articles 280 and 282 of the Russian Criminal Code).

Journalism and political activism

Boris Stomakhin was an editor of monthly newspaper "Radical Politics" since 2000. Besides, he contributed numerous materials to Kavkaz Center, the Islamic internet agency that promotes independence of Chechnya and is maintained by Chechen separatists.

Stomakhin in his articles advocated terrorist attacks on Russian civilians, called to overthrow violently current government of Russian Federation, advocated extermination of all Russians, claimed that Russian troops in Chechnya are "occupiers" and compared President Vladimir Putin to Saddam Hussein and Slobodan Milošević. According to his court sentence, Stomakhin also stated that modern Russia is Evil empire and therefore must be destroyed, and considered Shamil Basaev and Salman Raduev as heroes of Chechen resistance whose terrorist activities are legitimate . However, some human rights activists like Valeria Novodvorskaya and Yakov Krotov did not believe that he actually promoted any terrorist activities

Some journalists like M. Smolin from Komsomolskaya Pravda described his views as extremely russophobic, and suggested that Stomakhin is mentally ill.

Stomakhin criticized Russian government in defamatory and obscene statements.

Orthodox religion, according to Stomakhin opinion, should be liquidated and he called not to recognize such religion.

Stomakhin was a leader of a radical political group "Revolutionary Contact Association" (RCA). Other members of this organization are Pavel Kantor, Dmitry Tarasov, Ludmila Evstifeeva, and Pavel Luzakov. They organized a number of pickets against Russian foreign policy in Ukraine, Estonia, Belarus, Chechnya.

According to the Russian newspaper Utro Stomakhin's organization might be involved with Chechen hostage-takers, based on information provided by FSB. Utro alleged that during the Moscow theater hostage crisis, terrorists had "contacted with activists of Revolutionary Contact Association" and they "may be involved in supplying terrorists with ammunition and its storing at Moscow"

Stomakhin was accused of the extremist activities, calls to violent change of Constitutional regime, calls to violate territorial integrity of Russian Federation, hate speech, inciting ethnic and religious hatred in his articles, which covered among other things, the Chechen conflict, the Russian Orthodox Church, and Russian nation. A case against him was opened in December 2003. His home was raided in April 2004 and his computers and books were confiscated for the expertise. Stomakhin was interrogated. The Psychiatric expertise at Moscow Serbsky Institute found that Stomakhin is competent for the trial. Stomakhin escaped to the Ukraine seeking political asylum status, which was eventually denied, despite Stomakhin's claims that he is politically prosecuted in Russian Federation.

Arrest and trial

Having returned to Moscow, Stomakhin was arrested on March 21 2006. Stomakhin tried to escape during his arrest and fell down from fourth floor of his building, according to his lawyer Alexei Golubev and news reports His spine and bones were broken as a result.

He was sentenced to five years of prison for extremist activities, inciting religious and ethnic hatred, promoting violent change of constitutional regime, calls for violation of terriorial integrity of Russian Federation, defamatory statements(articles 280 and 282 of the Russian Criminal Code).

Below are several Stomakhin's citations cited as incriminating evidence in the court sentence:

"Bombing in Moscow subway was justified, natural and legal... The Chechens have full moral right to blow up anything they want in Russia after all that Russia and Russians did to them, none objections on humanism and philanthropy could be accepted."
"We, 'Revolutionary Contact Association' and 'Radical Politics' are united with the Committee and are ready to cooperate with it. It is understood that we are lot more radical than it. We are for not waiting until 2008 and we shouldn't bother ourselves particularly with Constitution, but we are for calling people to overthrow and liquidate Putin's regime as soon as possible. And we at all do not see possibility of preserving of present Russian Federation as a single state. But we are for common front with all our allies, even more moderate".
"Let tens of new Chechen snipers take their positions in the mountain ridges and the city ruins and let hundreds, thousands of aggressors fall under righteous bullets! No mercy! Death to the Russian occupiers!"
"After all, with the same Budanov's - maniacs, blood lusting sadists, murderers and degenerates with epaulets - all Chechnya is currently filled up. And it is Russian occupation army consists of these same Budanov's".
"In Chechnya Russian army ceased to exist as a military structure of a state, finally turned into devilish gang of marauders and killers, intoxicated with narcotics gang".

Stomakhin pleaded not guilty. According to RIA Novosti, news agency, cited by the Committee to Protect Journalists he said he was "tried for his views and not for any real crime. ... In the articles, I expressed my opinion, with which people were free to agree or disagree." He said an opinion was not a “call to action.”. However, according to the official court sentence, Stomahin pleaded not guilty on the grounds that he never made public appeals for extremist activities, never called for violent change of the constitutional regime, and never incited ethnic hatred.

Commentaries

ARTICLE 19 international organization, which protects free speech, stated that "we do not believe Mr. Stomakhin’s comments can be interpreted as incitement to ethnic hatred."

Valeria Novodvorskaya, government opposition figure, leader of the Democratic Union, claimed that the prosecution of Stomakhin was the start of a wider campaign, "because together with him, the entire human rights sector and the entire democratic movement will be put on trial for disagreeing with the majority, for not accepting the state policy of the Russian Federation, for sympathizing with the Chechen people, for anti-war demonstrations and pickets."

According to Micah H. Naftalin, Director of Union of Councils for Soviet Jews, "Bogus charges aimed at stifling dissent, cruel police tactics, ethnic bias, and blatant disregard for criminal procedural statutes are all on open display. We hope that others will join us in condemning this travesty of justice" . He argued that Stomakhin's sentence was disproportionate, but acknowledged that Stomakhin's statements were radical. He emphasized that Boris Stomakhin did not do anything violent, unlike in many other real hate crime cases that were not prosecuted by Russian authorities. According to the statement of Union of Councils for Jews in the Former Soviet Union, Stomakhin 'was probably pushed from the window', however this accusation contradicts to numerous mass media and NGO reports and statements by Stomakhin's lawyer Alexei Golubev according to which Stomakhin jumped out of the window voluntarily.

Soviet dissident Vladimir Bukovsky signed the letter that condemned the conviction of Stomakhin as prosecution of free speech. It was noted in the letter that many famous Russian writers were very critical of Russian nation and cited Nikolai Chernyshevsky who said that Russians are "a pitiful nation of slaves. We are all slaves, from the top to the bottom "

Widow of Andrei Sakharov Elena Bonner signed the letter which stated that Stomakhin is not guilty in extremism and hate speech, and he is a victim of political prosecution like Soviet dissidents who were prosecuted for their writings by Yuri Andropov.

Former FSB officer, writer, and dissident Aleksander Litvinenko praised Stomakhin as "last conscience of Russia" . Litvinenko also stated the he fully supports the following Stomakhin's citation: "Not pacifist wails of 'human rights activists', not agreements and 'negotiations' with executioners and sadists - but only an armed strike!", compromising his alleged status as a prisoner of conscience. Even such vocal supporters of Stomakhin as Valeria Novodvorskaya agree that Stomakhin is not a "prisoner of conscience" since he supported violence .

Human rights activist Svetlana Gannushkina and politician Valeria Novodvorskaya argued that Stomakhin's writings while outrageous had not been a public threat: they were very unlikely to incite anybody. According to Gannushkina and Novodvorskaya the neofascists who pose a real threat usually receive only minimal sentences or no sentences at all. Thus, the five year prison term to Stomahin is extremely excessive . However, Gannushkina in the same interview acknowledged that some Stomakhin's articles were 'absolutely outrageous' and she 'categorically disagrees with what was written or told by Stomakhin'.

Journalist Vladimir Abarinov criticized conviction of Stomakhin He noted that the criminal case against Stomakhin was opened based on an article about Russian Orthodox Church that was not written by Stomakhin. It was established by the court that Stomakhin actually plagiarized this article from the Live Journal entry, as well as other publications of numerous news agencies. The authors of the original works refused to share their responsibility with Stomakhin because Stomakhin had published their works without permission and distorted the original meaning

Critics of the court decision were strongly censured by Russian publicist Maxim Sokolov. In his newspaper article published after the conviction of Stomakhin he argued that unlimited hate speech should be prosecuted according to the article 282 of the criminal code. He cited Stomakhin's article Death to Russia published on the website of the Revolutionary Contact Association . The article was written in response to murder of last elected president of unrecognized by the world community Chechen Republic of Ichkeria Aslan Maskhadov by Russian forces.

The Stomakhin's article contained the following passages written by Stomakhin: Kill, Kill, Kill! To flood all Russia with blood, to not give a quarter to anyone, to try to make at least one atomic explosion on the territory of Russian Federation -- this is like the program of radical Resistance should be, and Russian's, and Chechen's, and anyone's! Let the Russians, according to their deserts, reap as they has sown . Russians should be killed, and only killed, for there is no one among them who is normal, intelligent, or who can be talked with and for understanding of whom we could rely. Harsh collective responsibility of all Russians should be introduced, of all loyal Russian citizens for the actions of the government elected by them -- for the genocide, executions, ordeals, trade with corpses... From that moment there should be no division of killers on combatant and non-combatant, wilful or forced. According to Sokolov the cited passages made application of the article 282 completely appropriate.

References

^ Official Court Sentence on Russian language dated 20.11.2006
^ Official conviction of Boris Stomakhin
^ Lenta.ru news agency article
Independent journalist given five-year sentence allegedly for inciting ethnic strife
^ Boris Stomakhin:Victim of the Regime or a Terrorist Radio Liberty Template:Ru icon
Komsomolskaya Pravda article
Rossiyskaya Gazeta article
Press article Baraev's group was assisted by someone from Moscow
^ Prima News Agency report
^ NewsRu Agency report
^ Lenta.Ru Agency report
^ Regnum News Agency report
^ Grani News Agency report
^ Human Rights Activists Website of Valeria Novodvorskaya article
^ Center of Extremal Journalism article
^ RIAN News Agency investigation
^ RIAN News Agency news article
ARTICLE 19’S STATEMENT ON THE CONVICTION OF RUSSIAN NEWSPAPER EDITOR BORIS STOMAKHIN, 23 November 2006
KAVKAZ-CENTER WRITER APPEALS JAIL SENTENCE - by Jamestown Foundation
UCSJ Calls For Fair Trial of Russian Jewish Activist, statement of UCSJ November 9, 2006)
Collective open letter by Vladimir Bukovsky and others
Letter by Sannikova, signed by Bonner.
Opinion of Aleksander Litvineko (Russian)
^ Conviction of Boris Stomakhin: Opinions (Russian) - by Anna Karpuk for grani.ru
Scapegoats - by Valeria Novodvorskaya for grani.ru
Second-hand fascism - by Valeria Novodvorskaya for grani.ru
^ Stomakhin Case - by Vladimir Abarinov for grani.ru.
Official Court Sentence on Russian language dated 20.11.2006
^ Maxim Sokolov Trap-282 Izvestia 23 November 2006
^ Boris Stomakhin article Death to Russia

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