In victory for agit-prop over news, French weekly convicted of libelling pro-Kremlin youth movement

In a 21 April ruling, Moscow’s Savyolovsky district court ordered the French weekly Le Journal du Dimanche (JDD) to pay 250,000 rubles (6,000 euros) in damages to the pro-Putin youth movement Nashi for a September 2009 article about Nashi’s activities. Nashi has also sued the French daily Le Monde, the British daily The Independent and other media. The youth movement’s strategy of bringing lots of defamation suits against both Russian and international media is surprising and raises many questions about the objectives of those running it. If the aim is to intimidate the news media, the initiative fortunately seems so far to have had little success. On the one hand, judges have in some cases dismissed Nashi’s lawsuits. This happened in the action Nashi recently brought against the Moscow-based radio station Ekho Moskvy. On the other hand, the pro-Kremlin youth activists often end up settling out of court after filing suit. In a preliminary hearing in Nashi’s suit against Le Monde on 13 January, the same court rejected Le Monde’s request for the case to be tried in France. Although apparently unfavourable for the newspaper, the decision limits the impact of any verdict that may be reached as Le Monde has no legal representation in Russia that could be affected. The same goes for JDD. One can rightly wonder about the role that Nashi is meant to play and whether its lawsuits are designed to protect not so much its reputation as its notoriety and its popularity with a segment of the Russian population that is tired of the usual propaganda. Nashi has a visible presence at the grass roots. It prospers by seizing the few spaces for debate available in Russian society. It takes issue with those who worry about “Soviet” hangovers in Russian society, brands them as enemies, champions the national – and Soviet – heritage, sustains popular misconceptions and opposes any attempt to shed light on the past or examine the present critically. Neither Nashi nor those who support it seem to have any interest in Russian society taking a calm look at such issues. The reports in JDD, Le Monde and other media that prompted the Nashi lawsuits referred to a controversy about an article by journalist, writer and former Soviet dissident Alexandr Podrabinek entitled “Soviets versus Anti-Soviet.” It was a response to Second World War veterans who were outraged by the opening of a restaurant in Moscow called “Anti-Soviet” and demanded that it change its name. Podrabinek was forced to go into hiding because of the threats he received over his article. Nashi’s activists joined the debate by staging several days of demonstrations outside Podrabinek’s home, along with other antics. The local authorities gave permission for Nashi’s protests although requests by NGOs critical of the authorities for permission to hold demonstrations are routinely denied. The articles that upset Nashi were opinion pieces about an ongoing controversy, one reflecting an emerging debate within Russian society. The debate about the Soviet heritage is growing and it is a good thing. One the latest examples is an outcry about a decision by Moscow’s powerful mayor, Yury Luzhkov, to put up large billboards glorifying Stalin for the 9 May festivities marking Russia’s victory over Nazi Germany. The move has been condemned by the Civic Chamber, the NGO Memorial and even a Kremlin committee. An initiative by three Russian media is meant to contribute to the historical debate. Entitled “Attention to History,” it will look at controversial periods in Russia’s history. And how has Nashi contributed? By harassing these media and some of their contributors and journalists. Another youth movement, Molodaya Rossia, is following suit. It announced on 22 April that it will stage daily demonstrations outside Ekho Moskvy to make it suspend broadcasting on 9 May because the veterans of the “Great Patriotic War” were offended by its programmes. If Russia does take a closer look at its history, it is to be hoped that movements such as Nashi, embodying opposition to change and a readiness to resort to intimidation, will lose influence, that fewer and fewer people will accept its refusal to distinguish the positive from the negative in Russia’s past, and that propaganda will be replaced by real debate. Unfortunately, to judge from their recent decisions on such matters, the Russian courts cannot be counted among the forces of progress.