Teenage Kremlin critic commits suicide amid abuse over pro-Ukraine activism

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/russia/12072002/Teenage-Kremlin-critic-commits-suicide-amid-abuse-over-pro-Ukraine-activism.html

28 December 2015

Vlad Kolesnikov was found dead after taking overdose on Christmas Day, following a public backlash described by rights groups as 'hideous' over his criticism of Russian policy.

An 18-year-old Russian boy who suffered a major public backlash after criticising Russia's policies in Ukraine has committed suicide.

Vlad Kolesnikov took an overdose of undisclosed pills on Christmas Day, having sent a suicide note to a journalist friend over the messenger Telegram just hours prior.

“If I don't get in touch in the next 2-6 days, you can write about me. It means I'm dead. I took a lethal dose,” a message sent from Mr Kolesnikov to Radio Liberty journalist Claire Bigg read, according to the publication.

Hours after that message, police in Russia's Samara region discovered the teenager's body.

Mr Kolesnikov's death has triggered an uproar among human rights activists in Ukraine and Russia, who say the fanatical pro-Kremlin atmosphere in “Putin's Russia” led to the bullying and abuse that pushed the young activist over the edge.

The Twitter hashtag #VladKolesnikov was trending in Russia for days after his death, and even top Ukrainian officials expressed their condolences.

Alexander Scherba, a representative for Ukraine's Foreign Ministry, said there should be a “place in heaven … for those ready to go against the weak will of millions of their fellow countrymen” in comments on Twitter.

Halya Coynash of the Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, a Ukraine-based partner of Amnesty International and the Moscow Helsinki Group, called the situation “hideous” and said Mr Kolesnikov's death was not the result of anything as benign as teenage bullying.

“It has become dangerous for anybody to express opposition to Russian aggression … and he was just a boy. With a family who was ashamed of him,” Ms Coynash told The Telegraph. Mr Kolesnikov's grandfather, a former KGB agent and a supporter of President Vladimir Putin, exiled him from his home in the summer, after the teenager first made his stance on the Ukraine conflict clear.

Russia's official response on the matter has been minimal.

Russian investigators have sought to play down the incident, saying in an official statement on Dec. 25 that Mr Kolesnikov's death was an accident caused by drinking too much alcohol and mixing it with drugs and energy drinks.

In the weeks leading up to his death, however, the young Mr Kolesnikov had made it very clear that he had fallen victim to a harassment campaign for his outspoken political views, telling Ms Bigg that he was consistently beaten up and harassed and that the only way out he saw was suicide.

Mr Kolesnikov shot to fame last summer after wearing a “Return Crimea” T-shirt to his school in Podolsk, a move which prompted his school to expel him and the police to pay him a visit asking where he got the shirt, according to Radio Liberty. Later, he showed up to a military enlistment office playing Ukraine's national anthem on his phone, prompting enlistment officers to diagnose him with a “personality disorder”.

Weeks before his death, Mr Kolesnikov said an appeal to police had been met only with further abuse from police officers, who told him they would not help him and would themselves like to beat him up for his behaviour.

According to Ms Bigg, shortly before his death, efforts were under way to relocate Mr Kolesnikov with the help of foreign nongovernmental organisations. Ms Bigg did not specify which organisations were involved, but several people close to the matter said they could not provide any details as it might jeopardise the safety of one of Mr Kolesnikov's close friends, who was also involved in pro-Ukrainian activism and remains on police radar.

Allison Quinn

How My Friend, Vlad Kolesnikov, Was Driven to His Death in Putin's Russia

www.rferl.org/content/how-my-friend-vlad-kolesnikov-was-driven-to-death-in-putin-russia/27451872.html

December 27, 2015

"Vlad Kolesnikov. Last seen Dec 25 at 13.36."

My Telegram account is silent. Eerily, excruciatingly silent.

Vlad's last message came on December 25, right after Christmas lunch as my children were noisily running out of the door for an afternoon walk.

"If I don't get in touch in the next 2-6 days, you can write [about me]. It means I'm dead," it said. "I took a lethal dose."​

"Sorry," he added, thoughtful right until the end.

He didn't answer my calls. My panicked messages never reached him, either. They are still marked as unread. I contacted someone in Russia, who I thought could help.

A few hours later, police confirmed my worst fears: Vlad had passed away, killed by an overdose of prescription drugs. The teen who had been my daily online companion for weeks was now lying dead on the cold slab of some distant Russian morgue.

His name was Vladislav Pavlovich Kolesnikov. He was 18.

As a journalist, I had written about Vlad's troubles before. But when I contacted him again on December 2 to follow up, his answer looked like a cry for help. He seemed desperate and wanted to talk to me about his life. We chatted on Telegram, often several times a day. Most of the time, I just listened.

Vlad asked me to tell his story if anything happened to him. He wanted the world to know about the persecution, the violence, and the crushing isolation that can befall anyone in Russia deemed to be different.

This was his dying wish.

Act Of Bravery

What can prompt a smart, educated, healthy boy of 18 to take his own life?

Unfortunately, in today's Russia, it doesn't take much.

The incident that sent Vlad's life tumbling down like a house of cards is absurdly, almost indecently trivial. But amid the hateful war-mongering now spilling from Russian television screens, even a kid's prank, it turns out, can be deadly.

On June 3, Vlad showed up at his school in the Moscow suburb of Podolsk with a T-shirt featuring a Ukrainian flag and the words: "Return Crimea." In Russia's current political context, this can safely be called an act of bravery.

Vlad was not Ukrainian. He was not a human rights defender or a political activist, either.

He was simply a young Russian who firmly disapproved of his country's actions in Ukraine. And unlike many others, he was not afraid of saying it out loud. A few weeks earlier, he had played the Ukrainian national anthem on his mobile phone during a compulsory visit to the military conscription office.

Several days after the T-shirt incident, he was assaulted by classmates.

"Just a split lip, a few bruises, some bumps on the head, and three drops of blood," he wrote on Facebook, trying to put on a brave face.

But those around him had no intention of letting it go.

Police officers came to question him. At the conscription office, military officials slapped him with a diagnosis: "personality disorder."

He was excluded from school. "At his own request," he was informed.

Worse still, his own grandfather, in whose apartment Vlad was living in Podolsk, drove him out of the house.

He packed him off on the train to his father in the small town of Zhigulyovsk, in the Samara region, threatening to wring his neck if he ever returned.

That was still not enough.

Shamed

He proceeded to shame his grandson in a scathing interview to the Komsomolskaya Pravda tabloid, calling him fat, accusing him of courting the West's favor, and citing passages from his diary.

Komsomolskaya Pravda was only too happy to oblige.

Vlad was still 17 at the time, a minor, almost a child.

"Even in my worst nightmare I could not have imagined that such a machine would be set in motion because of a piece of cloth and a small flag," he later wrote to me.

Life in Zhigulyovsk brought him little solace.

Rumors of his budding homosexuality did not help. He said his schoolmates routinely beat him up, pushed him around, spat at him, and flung mud and snow in his face.

They called him "khokhol" and "pidoras," crude insults denigrating Ukrainians and homosexuals.

"I can't even remember how many times I've been beaten up," he wrote to me. "Or I'm just walking down the corridor and someone calls me 'bitch' and hits me in the ear."

He told me that a local vigilante had pledged to ensure he would "never finish school."

His father, he said, was unsupportive and had warned him against causing any trouble in Zhigulyovsk.

The police had apparently threatened him, too.

"For a whole hour, they humiliated me and told me how dangerous it was here," he wrote. "They made me understand that they wouldn't lift a finger if anything happened to me. That they would punch me in the face themselves if they could."

Vlad was scared. Very scared. And he was completely alone.

Many knew about his plight. Vlad had more than 2,000 followers on Facebook. But for some reason, no compassionate teacher flew to his rescue, no classmate's concerned parent, no human rights campaigner.

With the exception of his friend, a schoolmate from Podolsk whom he said he was in love with, he was alone.

Understand me right, I'm no Russia-basher. I spent many happy years in Russia and there's a lot to love about this country.

But I can't help wondering what kind of society drives children against each other, where families turn their backs on their own kids.

Now, investigators are trying to paint Vlad's suicide as an accidental "poisoning" from booze and drugs.

They won't even let him die with dignity. 

But I knew about the meds.

I knew that he and his friend -- who was interned in a psychiatric ward for more than a month after taking part in Vlad's pro-Ukraine stunt -- had been considering suicide.

"I will say this to you only and to no one else," he wrote to me on December 14. "We both have a lethal dose of drugs. I will tell you honestly, I would already have taken them were it not for you. You give me some hope. A sliver, but still."

"There's nothing here for us anymore -- I won't be able to finish my studies, or work," he continued.

"Do NOT take anything!!!" I wrote back.

I had put Vlad in touch with a trusted friend of mine, a civil society advocate. She had alerted lawyers and foreign NGOs that ran evacuation programs. There were forms to fill in. References to provide. E-mails to send.

Vlad slowly let this sliver of hope slip away. He grew tired. He felt like his world had caved in and there was no way out.

"I believe you and I trust you," he wrote to me several days before he died. "But I don't believe in miracles."

I did everything I could to save Vlad, but I failed. We all failed him.

Vlad was an endearing boy. He was smart, and brave, and curious. And despite his harrowing ordeal, he was also caring.

On the eve of his death, he wished my family a wonderful Christmas.

"Good luck with the presents, I hope everything goes perfectly!" he wrote. He even added a smiley.

Claire Bigg

Russian Military and Mercenaries Directly Implicated in Torture of Ukrainian Prisoners

Irina, worker of a petrol station, now member of reconnaissance team of pro-Russian rebels in the town of Makievka, eastern Ukraine, October 6, 2014. Credit: REUTERS/Shamil Zhumatov

www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/new-atlanticist/russian-military-and-mercenaries-directly-implicated-in-torture-of-ukrainian-prisoners

December 9, 2015

Ukrainian human rights activists believe that over 87 percent of Ukrainian soldiers and half the civilians who have been taken prisoner by Kremlin-backed, pro-Russian militants in the Donbas have been subjected to torture or ill treatment. Additionally, in over 40 percent of the so-called "interrogations," key roles were played by mercenaries from the Russian Federation or by people who identified themselves as Russian military personnel.

The coalition Justice for Peace in Donbas has just released a report entitled "Those Who Survived Hell." The study is based mainly on a survey of 165 people, both soldiers and civilians, who were held captive by the militants. In many cases, even those who were not themselves tortured report witnessing or hearing the torture of others. One-third of the soldiers in the study, as well as 16 percent of the civilians, had personally witnessed a death as the result of torture.

Oleh Martynenko, one of the authors of the report, notes that the conditions in which prisoners and hostages are held do not meet any international standards. In two-thirds of the imprisonment sites, no medical care is available. Disturbingly, however, the presence of medical staff is no guarantee of greater protection. The researchers found cases where medical workers had taken part in torture, by bringing the victim around in order for the torture to continue.

Martynenko says that the researchers had not anticipated the high ratio of mercenaries and Russian military personnel implicated in the torture of prisoners. This is grounds, he adds, for charging Russia with involvement in war crimes and other offenses—offenses that cannot fall under any "amnesty" currently promoted by Western leaders as part of a peace deal for the region.

Anyone is at risk

Groups organizing prisoner exchanges say that by July 1 of this year, around 2,500 hundred prisoners had been freed, and another 500 remained in captivity. Ukraine's Interior Ministry says that over 6,000 people have been taken prisoner or have disappeared without a trace, with the fate of 1,500 still unknown.

According to the study, most of the people who have been taken prisoner by the militants are local residents of areas under militant control, although some were simply trying to reach relatives or friends and were detained at checkpoints without explanation. Most chillingly, residents were taken from their homes or workplaces without warrants, and often the militants would then steal their property. Anyone can be targeted, the coalition points out.

One person recounts how six men wearing camouflage gear decorated with St. George ribbons and brandishing Kalashnikov rifles burst into his home and knocked down his elderly mother. He was dragged from the sofa and had his arms bound behind his back. The soldiers removed his computer, telephone, and wallet, and even took a bottle of vodka.

Oleksandra Matviychuk, one of the authors of the report, explains that people are usually accused of holding the wrong (pro-Ukrainian) views, of speaking Ukrainian, or of having Ukrainian flags and other symbols in their home. Or the militants accuse them of having taken part in Euromaidan or pro-unity marches. Sometimes they're accused of having photographed strategic places.

Maria Varfolomeyeva, the 30-year-old journalist who had stayed in Luhansk to care for her elderly grandmother, has now been held hostage since January. The militants claimed that, as an artillery spotter for the Ukrainian army, she had been photographing the militants' residences, and threatened her with a fifteen-year "sentence." There had been no shelling in Luhansk for months before she was seized. Negotiations are still underway to obtain her release, almost eleven months later.

Just under 12 percent of civilians detained were women. Half of these, including women who were pregnant or elderly, faced ill treatment.

Over 18 percent of all of those surveyed had been kicked or punched, and almost 22 percent were beaten with the militants' rifles. Almost 6 percent experienced other forms of torture, including electric shocks, squeezing of their toes or fingers with tweezers, multiple bullet wounds from shock pistols or similar weapons, and the use of sharp items to cause injury. Almost 75 percent of the civilians in captivity had been threatened with firearms or other weapons.

A woman taken prisoner said of her experience, "I was beaten by a man who called himself Oleg Kubrak. He threatened to rape me, and slashed my arms, legs, and neck with a knife." Another prisoner recounted, "The militants began to hit me with the butt of their machine guns around the head, back, to my arms. They pulled me arms behind my back. Each tried to hit me, each tried to grab me by the hair."

Russian captors

Of the Ukrainian soldiers and volunteer battalion members who were captured, 83 percent reported that they had been seized as a result of military clashes and with the direct involvement of Russian Federation forces. One Russian soldier, nicknamed "the Greek," even presented a document identifying himself as a special response Spetsnaz officer from Moscow; another was commander of the Pskov paratrooper unit.

The study showed that over 87 percent of the Ukrainian soldiers and volunteer fighters captured faced especially brutal treatment, including physical violence and deliberate maiming, as well as humiliation.

To intimidate others, and to show off their captives as "trophies," the militants have quite openly paraded the men they have taken captive. The most notorious occasion occurred in 2014, on Ukraine's Independence Day, August 24: militants from the self-proclaimed "Donetsk People's Republic" staged a shameful march through Donetsk of Ukrainian prisoners. A similar display took place in January this year.

Much of the above treatment, as well as documented cases of abductions and extrajudicial executions, fall within the scope of the International Criminal Court. Ukrainian human rights activists are adamant that Ukraine must ratify the Rome Statute as a matter of priority, so that those guilty of grave war crimes can be brought to answer for their offenses.

Halya Coynash

a member of the Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group

Ryssland: Treårigt fängelsestraff för otillåtna demonstrationer

http://fokusryssland.se/2015/12/08/tre-ars-fangelse-som-straff-for-otillatna-demonstrationer

8 december 2015

Ildar Dadin blev i går den förste att dömas enligt paragraf 212.1, om upprepade otillåtna demonstrationer. Tre års fängelse blev påföljden.

Förra året skärpte Ryssland lagstiftningen om massmöten. Förutom strängare påföljder för möten som genomförs utan tillstånd infördes ett nytt stycke i straffrätten, 212.1, som kan ge upp till fem års fängelse för den som inom loppet av 180 dagar fälls för tre sådana förseelser. Lagen har kritiserats av människorättsförsvarare.

Som Fokus Ryssland rapporterade i februari i år var Ildar Dadin en av de första att utredas för brott enligt det nya lagstycket. I går avslutades rättegången i Basmannyjräjongens domstol i Moskva. Dadin stod anklagad för fyra icke-tillståndsgivna demonstrationer under perioden augusti-december 2014.

I ett trotsigt slutanförande menade han att han bara utövat sin konstitutionella rätt. Han anklagade polisen för att vittna falskt och domaren för att bryta mot lagen. Åklagaren hade begärt två års fängelse men domaren, Natalja Dudar, beslöt att ge Dadin tre års fängelse. Efter att domen fallit utbröt tumult i rättssalen.

Källor: Slon.ru, Aboutru.com

ZDFzoom vom 02.12.2015 - Spur nach Moskau - Warum Litwinenko sterben mußte

Följden av svenska gränskontroller: Första fallet med båtflyktingar

http://svenska.yle.fi/artikel/2015/12/02/foljden-av-svenska-granskontroller-forsta-fallet-med-batflyktingar

2 december 2015

Den svenska regeringens beslut att införa gränskontroller har nu lett till det första fallet med flyktingar som kommit till Sverige i gummibåt. Det rapporterar Dagens Nyheter med hänvisning till en hemlig underrättelserapport

.

DN har fått ta del av en hemligstämplad underrättelserapport som svenska polisens nationella operativa avdelning skrev till det svenska justitieministeriet i fredags.

Där framgår att fem flyktingar anlänt i en gummibåt till hamnen i det östskånska samhället Skillinge. Av rapporten framgår inte varifrån flyktingarna kom.

Det är inte klarlagt om det här fallet handlade om människosmuggling, men rapporten slår också fast att efterfrågan på människosmugglare är stor och att de införda gränskontrollerna inte kommer att påverka efterfrågan, men förändra smugglarnas sätt att operera.

Jarl Holmström, operativ chef för polisen i regionen befarar att gränskontrollerna har ökat människosmugglingen.

- Jag har en stark uppfattning om att det är så, säger Holmström till DN, men samtidigt konstaterar han att antalet flyktingar som söker sig till Sverige har minskat sedan gränskontrollerna infördes.

Enligt polisrapporten ser det också ut att ha blivit en trend bland flyktingar att nu försöka ta sig in i Sverige genom att gömma sig i olika transportmedel.

Finland: Blivande asylmottagning brändes ner med flit

http://svenska.yle.fi/artikel/2015/12/02/blivande-asylmottagning-brandes-ner-med-flit

2 december 2015

Branden i Niinisalo i norra Satakunta var anlagd. Huset som brann skulle bli asylmottagning.

Trähuset totalförstördes under tisdagsförmiddagen. Polisen misstänkte att branden var anlagd, nu har tekniska undersökningar visat att misstankarna stämde.

Husets södra fasad antändes med flit, polisen avslöjar inte hur. Många har tipsat polisen om branden, men ingen är ännu gripen. Polisen har inte berättat om någon är misstänkt för branden.

Asylsökande skulle ha flyttat in i huset inom kort. Två av byggnaderna på området står fortfarande kvar och de kommer att tas i bruk som flyktingförläggningar. Enligt Migrationsverket kommer man inte att ändra sina planer på grund av branden.

Ingen människa skadades vid branden.

Finland: Fler våldtäkter på offentliga platser och rasistiska brott i Helsingfors

http://svenska.yle.fi/artikel/2015/12/02/fler-valdtakter-pa-offentliga-platser-och-rasistiska-brott-i-helsingfors

2 december 2015

Polisen i Helsingfors ser en topp vad gäller antalet våldtäkter som begås på offentliga platser. Också de rasistiska brotten har ökat i antal enligt polisen, som höll en ovanlig presskonferens om säkerhetsläget i Helsingfors.

I år har polisen redan fått vetskap om 14 våldtäkter på offentliga platser, jämfört med nio under hela fjolåret.

Våldtäktsfallen är koncentrerade kring området runt huvudbanan, och i tre av dem är en asylsökande misstänkt, enligt polisen.

Polisen påpekar ändå att våldtäkterna på offentliga platser bara utgör en bråkdel av alla våldtäkter som begås i Helsingfors. Det sammanlagda antalet våldtäkter brukar ligga på ungefär 300 per år i Helsingfors.

Också de rasistiska brotten har ökat ordentligt i år. Helsingforspolisen har i år fått in anmälningar om ungefär 70 rasistiska brott. I fjol var antalet några tiotal, så rasistbrottens antal har mer än fördubblats i år.

I de allvarligaste fallen handlar det om hets mot folkgrupp, och en stor andel begås på internet, enligt polisen.

Hans Rosling: Flyktingpojkar i Sverige ger obalans mellan könen

http://svenska.yle.fi/artikel/2015/11/28/hans-rosling-flyktingpojkar-ger-obalans-mellan-konen

28 november 2015

Professor Hans Rosling varnar för stor könsobalans i Sverige om den nuvarande flyktingströmmen fortsätter.

Rosling säger i Expressen att andelen tonårspojkar snart är lika stor som i Kina.

Om fyra månader kan representationen enligt Rosling vara 120 pojkar mot 100 flickor.

De flesta minderåriga personer som ansöker om asyl i Sverige är pojkar. Under januari-oktober anlände 23 349 ensamkommande minderåriga; av dem var 21 200 pojkar i åldern 13-17 år.

Pojkar får ta den farliga resan

Det finns nu cirka 35 000 fler tonårspojkar än tonårsflickor i Sverige.

Det finns enligt professor Rosling en del problem med dylik obalans mellan könen.

– Vi har goda skäl att betrakta det som en nackdel att det blir en påtaglig könsojämlikhet, säger Rosling i intervjun i Expressen.

Han nämner svårigheten med att hitta en partner, men också att jobb och utbildningar som personer av olika kön generellt söker sig till kan påverkas.

Enligt Rosling gör asylsystemet färden till Europa både dyr och farlig, och det är inte i första hand en flicka, som levt i en begränsad kultur, som skickas iväg.

Han betonar dock att det är mycket svåra situationer som ligger bakom beslut att överhuvudtaget skicka iväg någon på den livsfarliga resan.

Rosling är professor i internationell hälsa vid Karolinska institutet och han har deltagit aktivt i flyktingdebatten såsom förespråkare för de asylsökandes rättigheter.

Finländske justitieministern: Asylsökande är en säkerhetsrisk

http://svenska.yle.fi/artikel/2015/11/27/justitieministern-asylsokande-ar-en-sakerhetsrisk

27 november 2015

Justitie- och arbetsminister Jari Lindström (Sannf.) anser att de asylsökande utgör en säkerhetsrisk i Finland. Enligt Lindström utreder polisen som bäst kring tio våldtäktsfall där en asylsökande står som misstänkt.

Det är inte frågan om några nya våldtäktsfall, utan alla de fall som kommit till polisens kännedom under det här året.

Polisen informerade idag att en 14-årig flicka blev våldtagen i Reso i tisdags. 

En 19-årig man har häktats som misstänkt. Enligt polisen kom han för cirka ett år sen till Finland som asylsökande.

Det här är det andra fallet med våldtäkt på en 14-åring som har uppmärksammats denna vecka.

Minister Jari Lindström är upprörd över de här fallen och undrar varför våldtäktsmisstankar eller våldtäktsdomar inte påverkar asylprocessen.

- Enligt min personliga åsikt är det här väldigt konstigt, men det beror på gällande internationella avtal, säger Lindström.

Lindström vädjar ändå till medborgarna att inte stämpla alla asylsökande på grund av de här brottsmisstankarna.