Are Russias Neo-Nazis Upping the Ante?
On April 12, Eduard Chuvashov, a federal judge of the Russian Federation, was gunned down in front of his apartment building in Moscow in a contract-style killing. Russian President Dmitri Medvedev denounced the killing as “cynical” and vowed to bring the perpetrators to justice. Police officials stated that the murder may have been an act of retribution for the sentences Judge Chuvashov handed down against neo-Nazi skinheads convicted in violent hate crimes that targeted Russian minorities. Eduard Chuvashov Just last week, the 47-year-old judge sentenced two skinheads to 10 years in prison. Their group, the Ryno Gang, was convicted of killing 20 people of “non-Slavic” appearance and posting videos of the murders on the Internet. Earlier this year, in February 2010, Chuvashov jailed nine members of “White Wolves,” a gang of mostly teenage skinheads that clubbed and stabbed dark-skinned migrants to death. At some level, this brutal murder — as brazen as it was — may come as little sur
