Flashpoint Moscow

1,200 migrants detained in warehouse raid following violent Moscow riot

Moscow authorities have closed a vegetable warehouse and detained 1,200 people after a violent Sunday protest in Moscow’s residential area of Biryulyovo, where a young Russian was allegedly stabbed to death by a migrant last week.

A car with money and weapons has been found as Moscow police raided a warehouse which locals call the main attraction for migrants. On Sunday it turned into the scene of a mass anti imagrant violence which ended with nearly 400 arrests. 

A crowd of locals took to the streets in response for the fatal stabbing of a young Muscovite, which is now being blamed on a migrant. They now say the killing of a 25-year-old Russian was merely the last straw.  

Moscow nationalists and football fans were quick to use the situation to also take part in the protests. Initial gathering of locals was then supported by clearly anti-migrant attuned groups of people.

It appeared that locals have been calling on Moscow authorities to check the warehouse and relocate it to the outside of the city. As it is just 1km from the living area, people mainly complained about late hour work activity, noise from trucks, high levels of criminality and numerous migrants who rent apartments in the area. Dozens live in each apartment at the same time. Residents say to meet a Slavic-looking man after midnight is nearly impossible.

But authorities’ reply was diplomatic and short: “[Pokrovskaya] warehouse is a strategic object of food supplies for Moscow and, hence, the transfer is impossible.” 

Those supplies are mainly coming from Russia’s Republic of Dagestan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Azerbaijan and other neighboring CIS states.

According to Magomed Tolboev, an honorary president of a company which manages the warehouse, with closing Pokrovskaya, Moscow may lose more than 5 percent of all food supplies.

“You cannot close it. You just keep it in order. Now let the police be responsible for [the suspect],” Tolboev told RSN radio station.

In his opinion, responsibility for what is happening lies on corrupt local authorities and law enforcement.

“This whole situation is to blame on corrupt practices of municipality leaders, administration and so on, who cover all this. They need to ask themselves why they give migrants nationality and a work permit without due process. We cannot look after thousands of people,” he said.

Now there are informally three main demands. First of all people want the young man’s killer to be found and prosecuted. Next, for the warehouse to be closed and heads of regional administration and police department to be sacked. They suspect the latter of running a protection racket involving the migrants. 

Another hot spot in Sunday’s rally was a shopping mall. Protesters destroyed it first, after unsuccessful attempts to try reaching authorities.

Some now say the reason why a crowd of 300 people decided to attack it is that the mall is an “enclave” of migrants, where they not only trade, but also hide from authorities. 

Reuters reported that another 450 were detained in northeastern Moscow, also near a vegetables market employing migrant workers.

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Moscow anti-migrant riot: Murder suspect in custody, 276 held at ‘nationalist gathering’

Russian police have taken into custody an Azeri man suspected of killing an ethnic Russian last Thursday. The murder sparked Moscow’s worst rioting in three years. Officers detained 276 people on Tuesday in an attempt to prevent a new anti-migrant rally.

Almost 300 people – about a third of them minors – were detained in southern Moscow on Tuesday evening. They were all released soon after. Group of people gathered near Prazhskaya Metro station on Tuesday evening planning to stage a nationalist march in Western Biryulyovo. The district where Sunday’s unrest took place became the scene of the worst rioting in the capital in almost three years.

It comes as Muslims in Russia celebrate one of the main Islamic holidays, Kurban Bayram, or Eid al-Adha, with mass prayers in the city center. Nationalists dubbed their unsanctioned rally "Our Response to Kurban Bayram."

Earlier on Tuesday, police apprehended Orkhan Zeinalov, 30, in the town of Kolomna, located about 100 km from Moscow. The Azerbaijani national is suspected of stabbing to death a 25-year-old Muscovite, Egor Shcherbakov, last Thursday. According to a source who spoke to RIA Novosti, Zeinalov acknowledged his guilt in a conversation with investigators. The murder sparked public outrage and mass protests in Moscow, with 380 people detained Sunday.

Police said Zeinalov resisted the SWAT team as they tried to detain him, but no one was injured in the operation.

The suspect was detained at a park in Kolomna, where he was waiting for accomplices who had promised to help him escape law enforcement officers, a Moscow police source told RIA Novosti.

Zeinalov was transported to the capital in a helicopter and taken to a temporary detention facility. 

His landlord – who helped law enforcers track down the alleged killer - will receive the 1 million rubles (US$31,000) earlier promised for information about the suspect, the Moscow police press service said.

Russian Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin said “there is no doubt” that the detainee is exactly the person who committed the high-profile murder and that he will be punished. 

Zeinalov denies any involvement in the crime and investigators may organize an identity parade with a witness of the killing, Markin added.

However, police say that “in unofficial conversation” with investigators, the alleged murderer admitted his guilt.

Investigators plan to ask the court for Zeinalov's arrest on October 16.

On Saturday, a group of about 40 people gathered for a protest in the area, urging the police to find and punish the attacker. They demanded that the district’s police chief resign, and that a local vegetable warehouse where many migrants work be closed.   

The protest was followed by an unsanctioned anti-migrant rally on Sunday, which turned violent as hundreds of angry protesters – a mixture of local residents and nationalists – smashed windows in a shopping mall, turned over vehicles and rubbish tins, and attacked a warehouse run by natives of the Caucasus. 

The brother of Shcherbakov, Anton, asked people to refrain from provocations and conflicts with police.

“I don’t want Egor’s name to be used by third parties for some unclear purposes. I want to problem to be solved within the frame of the law,” he told ITAR-TASS.

Earlier, Egor’s girlfriend also said that she was against mass riots and did not want “interethnic conflicts” to be inflamed.

The protest on Sunday was the worst to take place in Moscow since a nationalist rally on December 11, 2010. Back then, several thousand football fans gathered on Manege Square near the Kremlin to commemorate the death of Egor Sviridov, a Spartak Moscow supporter. The 28-year-old was shot dead in a brawl by a group of men originally from Russia’s North Caucasus.

However, what started as a peaceful protest turned into a violent rally as soccer supporters and nationalists clashed with police. Dozens of protesters were detained.

Following the Manege Square incident, authorities stepped up the fight against extremism and xenophobia and toughened punishment for organizing illegal immigration. However, the situation still remains tense.

Domestic migration has been on the rise in recent years, which often leads to inter-ethnic tensions. Millions of immigrants also come to Russia from former Soviet republics to seek work and a better life.

According to statistics announced last spring by the Federal Migration Service, there are over three million illegal immigrants in Russia and 11 million legal visitors. However, unofficial estimates put the number of illegal immigrants at 10 to 12 million.

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