Putin's "circumcision" remarks sparked international outrage

MOSCOW, November 15 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) – Imposing restriction on the media's coverage of future anti-terrorist operations have been voted for by Russian MPs Wednesday, November 13.

The aim of the vote was to prevent a repeat of criticism following the Moscow theater siege last month, reported British daily, the Telegraph.

The paper said that the move was the latest in a series of blows to freedom of speech in Russia.

The amendment on media laws was approved by Russia's Federation Council (senate) by 145 votes to one, with two abstentions. The amendment had been massively approved in the lower house on November 1, less than a week after Russian special forces stormed a Moscow theater to end a three-day hostage crisis in which 128 people died, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).

Grigory Yavlinsky, head of the liberal Yabloko party in the State Duma (lower house), urged the senate in a written message to reject the amendment which he said would "create a basis for the limitation of free speech and the persecution of mass media."

A small group of Yabloko supporters demonstrated outside the senate during the discussion, carrying banners reading "Fight the terrorists, not the media."

The amendment follows the October 26 release operation in which almost all the hostages who died were killed by the effects of a knockout gas pumped into the theater to stun the 41-strong Chechen rebel commando which had been threatening to shoot the more than 800 hostages.

Russian media, while praising the rescue, were critical of government secrecy surrounding the operation, in particular the nature of the gas used to overcome the hostage-takers, and expressed some doubts about the official account.

The new law makes it illegal to broadcast and print news "serving propaganda or justifying extremist activities, including statements of people trying to stop an anti-terrorist operation and justification of such opposition."

It also bars the media from identifying the names of members of special forces and crisis units without first obtaining their agreement.

Russian journalists have criticized the clause banning information on the activities of "extremists," saying its vague phrasing could be used to further stifle information on the three-year war in Chechnya.

However, Federation Council speaker Sergei Mironov said the amendment was "in the interest of the journalists themselves because it clearly defines the relation between the military authorities and the media" and did not affect their work in other areas.

Moscow senator Vladimir Plotnikov said the restrictions were "in line with international norms."

Another senator, Nikolai Kondratenko, commented that "there has not been a free press in Russia for ages, all journalists take money, and the bill should be approved."

The senators also approved by 133 votes to two, with seven abstentions, an amendment that allows the authorities not to return the bodies of terrorists to their families.

Human rights groups have protested that the amendment grants impunity to Russian security forces in Chechnya widely perceived as committing human rights abuses on local residents.

The Kremlin said the bodies of the 41 Chechen rebels killed during the theater rescue assault would be buried in a mass grave at an unknown site and withheld from their families.

The amendments now have only to be approved by President Vladimir Putin to be signed into law.

The new laws grant the authorities "enormous freedom of interpretation" amounting to censorship, the Journalists' Union secretary Igor Yakovenko said on Moscow Echo radio.

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and the non-governmental organization Reporters without Borders also criticized the bill, warning of the risks of censorship.

Meanwhile, the Financial Times published an article on Thursday, November 14 quoting Jean Lemierre, the head of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) saying that Russia needs to improve further its record on human rights and media freedom if it is to maintain the pace of reform and boost foreign investment.

In the latest strategy report on Russia, issued every two years, Jean Lemierre, head of the EBRD, called for "deep democratisation - meaning the consistent and sustained implementation of the principles of pluralism and open society" as a key to reform, the Times reported.

When faced by a sensitive question on Chechnya at the Russia-EU summit, the Russian President Vladimir Putin advised the French reporter who asked the question to come to Moscow and get "circumcised".

The comment raised eyebrows at home and was reprimanded abroad, AFP said. While refraining from overt criticism, Russian media headlined with the remarks that raised eyebrows among numerous commentators and were reproved as "regrettable" by a European Commission spokesman.

The impromptu invitation followed a question by a French reporter at the closing press conference of Monday's summit in Brussels asking why Russia was using mine warfare in the separatist North Caucasus republic and "exterminating" Chechen civilians.

Clearly irritated, Putin launched into a vigorous defense of his uncompromising Chechnya policy, describing Chechen separatist rebels as "radical Islamists" who believe that all non-Muslims deserve to die.

Then, still speaking in Russian, Putin told the reporter: "If you are prepared to become a radical Islamist and undergo circumcision, I invite you to Moscow. We have specialists who can deal with this problem. I suggest that you have an operation so radical that nothing grows out of you again."

The remarks were not translated into English at the press conference and were unremarked on by EU leaders present at the event.

It was the first time Putin has addressed a journalist in public so crudely. The remarks were broadcast on Russian TVS television and reported in detail by several major Moscow newspapers and Internet sites.

The prominent coverage appeared at odds with the Russian media's generally compliant attitude to the official line on Chechnya.

"Invitation to a circumcision," the daily Vremya Novostei headlined, echoed by the daily Gazeta's which headline "Putin suggests Europe get circumcised."

Clearly sensing the potential for damage, Kremlin officials explained to reporters that Putin had been tired after a hectic summit schedule when he made the comment.

The daily Kommersant reported that Kremlin officials said Putin had been thrown off-guard by an "unexpected" question.

In Brussels, European Commission spokesman Jonathan Faull said Putin's choice of words was "regrettable" his intervention "entirely inappropriate."

He said European Commission president Romano Prodi was "rather pleased that he didn't hear it."

Putin has used earthy language on previous occasions in relation to the Chechen conflict.

Shortly after launching Russia's military intervention in the predominantly Muslim republic in October 1999, he promised to "waste (the Chechens) while they sit in their outhouses."

In a televised addressed to the nation after the bloody denouement of the Moscow hostage crisis last month, he described the hostage-takers -- many of them women, and most of them young -- as "scum."

A leading political analyst, Andrei Piontkovsky, noted that Putin's language was becoming "pathological."

"Every time he talks about Chechnya, he resorts to toilet vocabulary. This tendency is starting to disturb not only his Western partners but also the Moscow elite which had begun thinking of seeking a political solution to the Chechen conflict," he said.

Lev Gudkov, a sociologist, said that Chechnya was "a subject that cuts him to the quick, representing a clear failure of his policy, ... (and so) he uses a style of language inherited from the Soviet-era KGB, a mixture of criminal jargon and nomenklatura slang."

But another analyst, Yury Korgonyuk of the INDEM think-tank, believed Putin's use of strong language was deliberate.

"It's a way of saying: we will not discuss this subject with people who don't understand what it's about," he said.

Gudkov noted that Putin had become more aggressive in his language since joining U.S. President George W. Bush in his post-September 11 war on terror.

"He now sees himself as one of the big boys, beyond moral scruples and free to be openly brutal. Law and order, and repression, are increasingly setting the tone in Russia," he said.

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