Holding up dozens of anti-Semitic signs, hundreds of people rallied in central Moscow’s Tverskaya Street on Saturday to protest the arrest warrant out for nationalist leader Boris Mironov, wanted on charges of inciting interracial hatred.
The party that apparently organized the rally — the National Power Party of Russia — was banned by the Justice Ministry for inciting interracial hatred. On one poster held up at the rally, it identified itself as the party of “those who are ready to fight the Jewish yoke.”
While reporters from the independent Ekho Moskvy radio station found only 200 demonstrators Saturday afternoon, and no anti-Semitic signs of any kind, a MosNews correspondent estimated there were as many as 800 people gathered in Pushkin Square.
Their signs featured various accusations against the Jewish people, quoting historical figures such as Napoleon and Henry Ford.
“Jews! Disgusting types. Get your stinking paws away from Boris Mironov!” one sign read.
Another sign read that Jews were the “plague of society and its greatest foes.”
According to a new law passed earlier this year, all rallies must be registered with the Moscow prefecture. Yelena Polyakova, an official from the prefecture of Moscow’s central district, where organizers obtained permission for the rally, told MosNews that a public initiative group registered for the rally, calling itself the Slavic Journalists’ Union and wishing to hold a rally “in support of Russian Patriots.”
Polyakova said that since the National Power Party of Russia is banned, it cannot organize rallies itself. This must have been done for the party by the Slavic Journalists’ Union.
“Prosecutors were present at the rally, and they probably took note of the [anti-Semitic signs and] the presence of the party,” Polyakova told MosNews.
Mosca 17 Novembre 2004