Russia detains 11 skinheads for race attack

Reuters/November 22, 2006

Moscow - Russian police have detained 11 teenagers for beating an immigrant from former Soviet Kyrgyzstan with metal chains, a spokeswoman for the Moscow prosecutor said on Wednesday.

The group attacked 23-year-old Chingiz Kailypov, now in a coma, on a suburban Moscow commuter train on Sunday evening. Police are treating the attack as a racially motivated crime rather than hooliganism as previous race attacks have been termed in Russia.

"In the wagon of an electrical train a group of skinheads, wearing short black jackets and long boots and shouting nationalistic slogans, attacked Kailypov with their arms, legs and metal chains," spokeswoman Elena Rossokhina said.

The attackers were all teenagers, she said, and some were younger than 16-years-old.

Russia has witnessed a wave of race attacks in recent years, mainly on darker skinned immigrants from former Soviet Central Asia and the Caucasus. Some victims have died.