RUSSIA’S EXTREMIST ORGANIZATIONS HAVE OVER 6,000 UNDERAGE MEMBERS

MosNews, Russia
May 17 2006

More than 6,000 under-eighteens are registered by police as members of
extremist organizations, Russian Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliyev
said, addressing the State Duma during “government hour” in the
parliament on Wednesday, ITAR-TASS news agency reports. He stressed
that the involvement of underage persons in extremist activities
threatens the security of society.

Most of the teenagers are registered in Moscow, St. Petersburg,
Rostov and the Samara, Voronezh and Murmansk regions, Nurgaliyev said.

The minister noted that some electronic media were spreading extremist
propaganda. Reports and motion pictures demonstrating various methods
of committing a murder are being obtrusively repeated on various
channels and influence teenagers’ unstable psyche, Nurgaliev said. In
his words it was unfortunately difficult for a journalist not to cross
the fine line between a topical story and unintentional propaganda
of violence and cruelty.

Nurgaliyev cited the case of the murder of an Armenian man committed
by teenagers on March 12. A group of teenagers killed the Armenian
man in a Moscow-Monino suburban train. The man’s wife fortunately
survived in the incident. The attackers were detained and confessed
to their crime. Asked to explain their actions, they said they had
seen such acts reported in the media.

The minister also stressed the necessity of stopping the dissemination
of video tapes and other materials containing Nazi propaganda.

The minister also believes the Public Chamber, a consultative body
recently set up by President Putin, should address the problem and
give its recommendations.