外交政策：俄罗斯首都的种族战争

摘自2013年10月18日《外交政策》 原文标题The Race War in Russia's Capital

莫斯科逐渐酝酿的种族仇恨如何演变成暴力行为。

对很多居住在俄罗斯的穆斯林来说，今年的忠孝节是一个悲伤的日子。节日前夕，警察在莫斯科街头出动，逮捕了数百名非法移民，其中很多都是穆斯林。在我编辑这篇文章时，我想到了近期与我的一个朋友麦哥蒙德的对话。麦哥蒙德来自南部的达吉斯坦共和国，他一生都对俄罗斯充满感情，然而令他痛苦的是，他发现很多主流俄罗斯人并不领情。他喜爱俄罗斯的文化和语言，也对于达吉斯坦在200年前成为大俄罗斯的一部分颇感欣慰。但是，就像他很多居住在莫斯科的同胞们一样，他的俄语带有无法掩饰的口音，而且他的肤色比大部分欧洲俄罗斯人要黑一些。所以尽管他渴望像所有俄罗斯居民一样生活，但每天他经历的事情都与此完全相反：“如果你是来自高加索的黑皮肤家伙，他们就认为你是敌人。”

民族紧张的气氛最近在莫斯科持续升温，终于在上周日爆发。地点位于西部郊外一个名叫比留廖沃的城市，那里居住着大批来自高加索地区的移民。这是一个没落的工业城市，没有什么基础设施，没有地铁、污染严重，具备一切外来移民可以承受得起的生活条件。

我们首先必须了解，散居在这个国家的建筑工地和市场中的移民，大部分都在非法居留。他的原住地文化强调家庭纽带，因此在离开家乡之后，他们利用这样的网络来建立信任、彼此保护，而这种生活方式往往对外人造成不信任和威胁。在过去十年里，来自高加索地区的原苏联加盟共和国和中亚（主要是阿塞拜疆、格鲁吉亚、亚美尼亚、塔吉克斯坦和乌兹别克斯坦），以及俄罗斯境内的北高加索地区（达吉斯坦和车臣）的散居移民，垄断了这一地区的吉普赛出租车生意，还有人与当地官商形成了腐败网络。

克里姆林宫并没有采取措施惩罚那些非法剥削低收入人群的腐败官员，而是简单地关闭边境口岸。毋庸置疑，这提升了对廉价劳动力的需求程度，让问题更加恶化。坊间流传的移民通常生活在他们自己的排外信条中的流言，也恶化了民众的怨气。单纯的排外情绪也是一个因素。尽管俄罗斯长久以来就是个多民族融合的国家，但高加索地区的居民与欧洲俄罗斯人相貌有所不同，所以对于目前经济发展停滞、社会不公和腐败的怨气，很快就让他们发现自己其实是这个国家的“外人”。

比留廖沃的爆发只需要一点点火星。上周传出了一个新闻，一名阿塞拜疆移民在该地区把一名年轻俄罗斯人刺死，警方未能在第一时间逮捕嫌犯让当地的形势恶化。星期天下午，愤怒的人群聚集在一个巨大的蔬菜仓库中，据说那是附近犯罪活动的集中地。暴徒闯进一家经常雇用移民的购物中心，见上图。人群中有男人、女人和少年，他们宣称要把外国人赶出该地区，行动很快发展成暴乱。暴徒攻击街上所有肤色发黑的人，疯狂地殴打他们。愤怒的人群焚烧店铺和汽车，破坏超市中的商品，西瓜汁和番茄汁染红了地面。甚至当警察车辆到来，部分暴徒被逮捕之后，人群依然不愿退去。有些人愤怒地把警察包围，警察畏缩在防护盾牌后面。

亚历山大•贝罗夫是一个著名民族主义运动团体“俄国佬”的头领，他对我说，比留廖沃暴乱的参与者都是愤怒的普通居民，不是任何组织的活动分子。贝罗夫说他就在现场“关注并协调聚会”。根据他的叙述，当地人曾要求当局采取行动，由于没有得到回应，才走上街头殴打“黑鬼”。（这个侮辱性词语是指那些来自俄罗斯南部的少数民族。）

当局在星期一做出了回应，但并不是打击暴力行为，而是对受害者采取行动，有1200名来自南高加索和中亚国家的移民被逮捕。10月16日，暴乱发生之后的第三天，警方抓获了25岁的阿塞拜疆裔犯罪嫌疑人。在把他送上飞往莫斯科的直升飞机之前，警察对他进行殴打，还把整个过程录像。这说明了目前这个国家的种族关系是什么样的。

当局解决这个由民族情绪引发的暴力事件的唯一做法就是打击暴力活动的对象、彻底修订移民法、肆意逮捕、驱逐数百人。这些举措让民族主义运动团体领导人非常高兴，他们说，克里姆林宫终于听到了他们呼吁“把非斯拉夫面孔清除出俄罗斯”的声音。莫斯科市政府的一项声明更让他们乐不可支，当局决定关闭比留廖沃的蔬菜仓库，十多年来有数百名移民在那里工作。

这个星期的事情说明，对于自由反对派的活动人士，克里姆林宫更愿意容忍怀有民族仇恨的民众袭警。去年，检方对数十位反对派活动人士展开犯罪调查。与此相比，针对星期天的暴力事件，只有三个街头混混被作为组织者开始调查。政客间你争我夺向民族主义争宠，立法者在考虑是否禁止外国人租赁或购买不动产，除非申请特殊批准。反移民组织也在收集签名，支持收紧向中亚和南高加索游客发放签证。反对派领导人亚历克谢•纳瓦力经常被谴责迎合民族主义者，他支持移民改革政策。但是他的解决方案是基于强化反腐败法律，和创造一个企业不敢任意使用非法移民作为廉价劳动力的社会环境。

民族主义者贝罗夫说，他很高兴看到当局满足了比留廖沃暴乱事件背后的民众需求。他说：“我们与自由反对派不同，我们不会高喊‘普京下台’，而是在寻求具体问题的解决方案：关闭少数民族黑手党控制的市场、收紧中亚移民的签证制度、最终限制所有来自北高加索的人。”——尽管北高加索其实就是俄罗斯的一部分。

独立的专业人士说，打压移民的倾向实际上根植于政治制度内部。人权活动家坦妮娅•卢克西娜说：“克里姆林宫与俄罗斯民族主义分子妥协，是在玩一个危险的游戏，目的是转移公众对普京支持率下降的注意力。树立一个外国敌人要比反腐败、改体制容易得多。”当然，这种手段也最容易收到相反的效果。

原文：

MOSCOW — It's been a sad Eid al-Adha this year for many of the Muslims living in Russia. On the eve of the holiday this year, police took to the streets of Moscow to arrest hundreds of illegal residents, many of them Muslims. As I followed the news I found myself recalling a recent conversation with my friend Magomed. Magomed, who hails from the southern republic of Dagestan, has nurtured a lifelong fondness for the Russian heartland -- and it pains him to realize that many mainstream Russians often don't reciprocate. He's fond of Russian culture and the Russian language, and he's happy that Dagestan became a part of Russia two hundred years ago. Like the many people from his part of the country who now live in Moscow, however, he speaks Russian with a perceptible accent, and his skin is darker than that of many European Russians. So despite his longing to be treated like other Russian citizens, his everyday experience tends to be somewhat contradictory: "If you're a dark-skinned guy from the Caucasus, they assume you're the enemy." 

Ethnic tensions have been ratcheting up in Moscow lately, and last Sunday they exploded. The scene was a western suburb of the city known as Biryulevo, which has a large population of immigrants from the Caucasus. It's a depressing industrial district without many attractions, it's never had a subway station, and it's notorious for its bad pollution -- all reasons why immigrants have traditionally found it affordable. 

It's important to understand that most of the immigrants living on construction sites and markets all across the country are living in Russia illegally. They tend to come from cultures that stress close family ties, and they use those networks of trust to protect each other when they're outside of their homes, a tactic that can often generate fear and mistrust amongst those excluded. Over the past decade, diaspora groups from places like the former Soviet republics of the Caucasus and Central Asia (especially Azerbaijan, Georgia, Armenia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan), as well as the Russian territories in the North Caucasus (Dagestan and Chechnya), have monopolized the gypsy taxi network in the area. Others have established corrupt connections with local officials and businesses.

Instead of punishing corrupt employers for unlawfully taking advantage of low-wage workers, the Kremlin aims instead to close the borders -- which, needless to say, will merely boost the demand for cheap labor and thus end up exacerbating the problem. The widespread sense that the immigrants often live by their own clannish rules also aggravates resentment. Simple xenophobia is a factor, too. Despite Russia's long history as a multiethnic state, people from the Caucasus often look different from European Russians, and simmering discontent over current economic stagnation, inequality, and corruption can all too easily find itself transferred to the visible "others" within the community. 

Biryulevo just needed a spark to set it off. Last week came the news that an Azeri immigrant had stabbed a young Russian man to death in the area. The initial failure of the police to nab the suspected killer additionally inflamed the situation. On Sunday afternoon, an angry crowd converged on the area's huge vegetable warehouse, which is alleged to be a locus of criminal activity in the neighborhood. Rioters also broke into a shopping center famous for employing migrants, as seen in the photo above. The crowd, which included men, women, and teenagers, vowed to smoke the foreigners out of the area, and soon a full-fledged riot was under way. The rioters attacked anyone who looked "dark," beating some of them badly. Raging crowds burnt shops and cars and ruined stacks of market goods. The ground turned red from watermelon and tomato juice. Even when squads of police arrived by bus to club and detain riot participants, the rioters held their ground. In some cases, members of the angry crowd surrounded the policemen, who cowered under their riot shields. 

Alexander Belov, one of the leaders of a popular nationalist movement known as "Russkie" ("Russians"), told me that the participants in the Biryulevo pogrom were ordinary, angry citizens, not activists of any organized groups. Belov told me that he'd been on the scene "to monitor and coordinate the people's gathering." In his account, the locals had demanded action from the authorities, and, having received no response, proceeded to beat up the "blacks" (a slur often used for members of ethnic groups from southern Russia).

On Monday the authorities responded -- but not by cracking down on the architects of the violence. Instead they went after the victims, detaining more than 1,200 immigrants from the south Caucasus and Central Asian countries. On Oct. 16, three days after the riots, the police caught up with the 25-year-old Azeri man suspected to be responsible for the killing. It says a lot about the current state of race relations that the police had no compunction about recording themselves beating him up before they put him on a helicopter and flew him back to Moscow. 

The authorities' only solution to the problem of ethnically motivated violence seems to be a crackdown on its targets, draconian reform of immigration laws, and the arbitrary arrest and deportation of hundreds of people. Such initiatives make leaders of the nationalist movements happy: finally, they say, the Kremlin has heard their calls to "cleanse" Russia of non-Slav faces. They were especially pleased by the announcement that the Moscow city government has decided to shut down the vegetable storehouse in Biryulevo, which has employed hundreds of immigrants for over a decade. 

This week's events show that the Kremlin has more tolerance for angry crowds fighting the police over ethnic hatred than they do for liberal opposition activists. Last year, prosecutors started criminal investigations against dozens of opposition activists; by contrast, only three hooliganism cases have been opened against organizers of the Sunday event. Politicians are scrambling over each other in their efforts to cater to the nationalist fervor. Lawmakers are considering banning foreigners from renting or buying real estate without a special permit. Anti-immigrant groups are also collecting signatures in support of instituting a visa regime for visitors from Central Asia and the South Caucasus. The opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who is sometimes accused of pandering to the nationalists, supports the idea of immigration reform. But the solutions he proposes are based on reinforcing the rule of law by fighting corruption and creating conditions to prevent businesses from daring to use the cheap labor of illegal immigrants. 

The nationalist Belov says he is happy to see how authorities meet the demands of the people who were behind the Biryulevo pogrom: "Unlike the liberal opposition, we don't yell "Down with Putin!" he told me. "Instead we ask for solutions to concrete issues: to close markets run by ethnic mafias, to establish a visa regime for Central Asian immigrants and eventually for anybody who comes from the North Caucasus" -- even though the North Caucasus is actually part of Russia. 

Independent experts say that the crackdown on immigrants is actually rooted in politics. "The Kremlin is playing a dangerous game of compromise with Russian nationalists in order to distract public opinion from the real picture of Putin's declining popularity," human rights activist Tanya Lokshina told me. "It's always easier to create a foreign enemy than to fight corruption and improve the system." That is, of course, a tactic that could easily backfire.

（四月网编译：满仓）