Report of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation
2015 marks the 70th anniversary of the end of the bloodiest War in the history of mankind that claimed lives of 60 million people. Many countries and peoples have contributed to the Victory but crucial role of the multinational USSR that sacrificed 27 million lives of its citizens remains undeniable. It is a fact that cannot be deleted from the history.
The Nuremberg Trials of 1946 disclosed to the world the details of horrifying crimes committed by Nazis, their allies and accomplices under the misanthropic concept of superiority and exceptionality. War crimes prosecution was an important milestone on the way of developing international law and international humanitarian law and the international human rights law. The Nazism as well as any related ideas and concepts of hatred based on race, religion and other criteria, was outlawed by the international community.
In the meantime the Nazi matrix is being obviously and rapidly brought back to life in a number of countries across the world. New forms and shapes of neo-Nazism emerge, it changes but emains malformed and dangerous. As the President Vladimir Putin said: “As soon as we let the seeds of antisemitism, neo-Nazism, national intolerance and chauvinism grow we will be facing severe consequences for the state and for the entire country. It is a destroying force”.
Some countries are making dangerous attempts to build state concepts of national identity and development on the basis of xenophobia and exceptionality. School books are being re-written, facts related to the World War II are being supplanted and falsified. Millions of liberator soldiers who gave their lives to fight the “brown plague” and to spare future generations from the disasters of war are being labeled as “occupants” and “criminals”. It even comes to absurd and waning announcements at the level of state authorities and international organizations that directly distort the facts related with the history of the World War II.
The present report of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation is primarily aimed at demonstrating current situation with the spread and potential consequences of the neo-Nazi threat in a number of countries. It is focused on the most outstanding and obvious tendencies in this sphere that pose extreme threat to the stability and security of the world order.
The report consists of three chapters. The first describes global neo-Nazi tendencies in a number of countries and demonstrates how they contradict international legal obligations in the sphere of combating Nazism, neo-Nazism, aggressive nationalism, discrimination, xenophobia, racism and other forms of intolerance. The second chapter of the report contains fundamental provisions of
international legal instruments and mechanisms. The third chapter exemplifies manifestations of neo-Nazism and related concepts and ideologies of hatred and points out the progress of a number of countries in combating neoNazism that requires further development and consolidation.
The data of the United Nations, the Council of Europe, the OSCE, international NGOs including human rights organizations such as Simon Wiesenthal Center and the International Human Rights Movement “World without Nazism”, reports of the national human rights structures, ombudsmen as well as statistics and researches of state authorities, studies of the leading world experts related to Nazism and neo-Nazism and documents from the Archive of Foreign Policy of the Russian Federation were used as sources in the preparation of this report.
The report is dedicated to the 70th anniversary of the Great Victory in commemoration of millions of people who have liberated the world from Nazism.
