| ST. PETERSBURG -- More than 500 protesters chanted, "Shame,
shame!" at a weekend rally to decry what they called city authorities'
indifference toward racism, and Russia's human rights ombudsman, Vladimir
Lukin, warned that quick action was needed to deal with racial intolerance.
City and police officials invited to address protesters' concerns at
the rally failed to show up, but sent a policeman with a digital camera
to film the protesters.
"We don't pay enough attention to the education of our people,"
Lukin told the rally Sunday on Sakharov Square. "The authorities
don't pay enough attention to this issue. But it looks like a small avalanche
is being formed that could snowball and destroy the government itself
if it doesn't deal with the problem."
Fam Kuang Tung, a Vietnamese student and a rally organizer, urged authorities
to open up their investigation into the stabbing death of a Vietnamese
student on Oct. 13.
"We haven't been given any details about the investigation yet,
and we think that the only way to achieve anything is by acting strong
and united," he said.
Vu An Tuan, 20, was attacked by a group of young men as he walked to
the metro at night. No suspects have been charged.
St. Petersburg Governor Valentina Matviyenko said Friday that she believes
the attack was linked to hooliganism, not racism, but promised that the
culprits would be brought to justice, Interfax reported.
Police often consider attacks against dark-skinned people to be hooliganism.
Police said Friday that the investigation into the student's death is
continuing and that they have narrowed down their list of suspects.
"Because the crime was committed late at night, it is quite difficult
to draw sketches of the suspects even though there were witnesses,"
a police official told Interfax. "In two weeks we have succeeded
in creating a sketch of one suspect, a young person aged 15 to 18, of
average height and with no striking features."
Sunday's protest was organized by foreign students together with human
rights advocates and liberal political parties Yabloko and the Union of
Right-Wing Forces.
Police insisted that demonstrators march to the square on a sidewalk
along Unversitetskaya Naberezhnaya so as not to disrupt the thin traffic
on the street, protesters said. A police officer carrying a digital camera
filmed them the whole time. "It feels very unpleasant," one
protester, a British citizen who only identified himself as Peter, said
as he pointed to the officer.
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