Holohoax Denial Is Not Illegal In Russia, Contrary To Many News Reports - Unlike Much Of The West

If you google 'holocaust denial Russia', you will find several news headlines claiming it is illegal, and a Wikipedia article saying the same thing. But it's not. This article explains where the disinformation is coming from and points out that Russia is much more free than the West in re-examining history.

Dr. Matthew Raphael Johnson: The controversial “Rehabilitation of Nazism” law in Russia, passed in 2009 and signed in 2014, has remained in its purely symbolic form until 2016. Prior to then, it was never invoked and no prosecutions ever derived from it. In fact, Russian mainstream publishers offer a dizzying array of anti-Judaic and “Holocaust denial” literature published regularly. Unlike the west, such attitudes are common rather than marginal.
However, Roman Yushkov, a Russian nationalist from Perm, the law's first test case, was tried on the grounds of “inciting ethnic hatred.” Yushkov used his VK account to attack the “conclusions” of the Nuremberg Tribunal. In particular, he rejected the “six million”claim. According to the western-financed, liberal SOVA Center, he stated on both his VK and Facebook pages, “Jews! Return the money to the Germans you stole by fraud by the “Holocaust [of the] six millions Jews!”
His articles were less emotional and conformed to the basic standards of journalism long lost in the west.

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The All-Russian Fascist Party, was a minor Russian émigré movement that was based in Manchukuo during the 1930s and 1940s. 

 

He had no fewer than three trials. Since this sort of case has never been tried in Russia before, the trial's procedure was chaotic. The case was brought by the Perm branch of the Chabad Hasidic sect, who had been quietly colonizing this ancient region of Old Russia. The case was brought by Vladimir Kliner, an Israeli citizen, multi-millionaire and financier of Chabad. His final acquittal came on September 6 2018. His first trial ended in an acquittal, but the second yielded a conviction, for which he was given probation, while and the third overturned that. Today, he's a free man.
The law in question is from Part 1 of Art. 354 of the Russian Criminal Code (incitement of national hatred). The law states explicitly that the issue is in “spreading intentionally false information” concerning the issues of the war and the Russian state far more than “ethnic” issues.
This is the only law of its kind condemned by Human Rights Watch. Why? Because it really has nothing to do with Jews or the war. The Russian version seeks to preserve the memory of the Russian state and its historic role in forming the Russian nation. It's a law against subversion. In 2009, the Medvedev administration convened the “Presidential Commission of the Russian Federation to Counter Attempts to Falsify History to the Detriment of Russia's Interests.” This was the fact-finding element of the law and served as its basis.
On the committee, apart from Duma members, were officers of the FSB and the Army, including retired General Nikolai Makarov and five professional historians. This law was patriotic in tone, not leftist. This committee described the purpose of the law. It never was aimed at scholarship.
It forbids the “artificial creation” of historical evidence. In other words, it criminalizes false history when it comes at the expense of Russian society. The law states “the spreading of information on military and memorial commemorative dates related to Russia’s defense that is clearly disrespectful of society, and to publicly desecrate symbols of Russia’s military glory” is banned. 

Russian laws against “extremism” also exist, but they are meant to combat violent groups and especially, their foreign sources of funding. It was initially passed in retaliation to Chechen terror in Russia and has nothing to do with scholarship or journalism. No law in Russia does. Disinformation from the western right-wing led many to believe rumors that this was a “Holocaust” law.
The purpose is to criminalize not just false facts, which are inadvertently mentioned all the time even by the best of historians, but the deliberate distortion of facts concerning the Russian state when done with malice. It is a defamation law relative to the state. Foreign Policy, an academic journal published by the Council on Foreign Relations, condemned the law. They've supported “denial” laws in the west. The title of their article was “First They Came for the Holocaust Deniers, and I Did Not Speak Out.” The establishment will throw its most sacred principles out the window to harm Russia.
Because these laws don't protect Jews, the west has condemned them. Thus, while defending the censorship of right wing thought in America, regardless of how academically presented, the journalists in the west uniformly condemned Russia's law on “Nazism.” Yushkov was the first to be attacked for actual journalism and serious research into these issues and rightfully, was acquitted, ensuring that it will not happen again.
The prosecutor's office in Perm, tightly connected to the Chabad Hasidim, was outraged that they lost their first case against Yushkov and sent an appeal to the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation demanding a new trial. In protest, thousands of VK users deliberately reprinted his article all over the network. No one was arrested. The law was a dead letter.
In their appeal to the Supreme Court, the Perm prosecutor claimed Yushkov “abused his rights” during trial through his “discrediting the testimony of witnesses.” In other words, he defeated his opponents in a courtroom debate over the Holocaust. He asked the prosecution witnesses “unacceptable questions,” according to the appeal.


The author is a well-known academic historian of Russia and Ukraine, which he approaches from a Christian (Russian Orthodox) and nationalist perspective, arguing that nationalism and Orthodoxy are inseparable. He also writes widely on current affairs. Rare for contemporary Western historians of Russia, he sources original materials in Russian, pulling back the veil on much misunderstanding, ranging from modern history back to Russia’s very beginnings in the Middle Ages.

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His personal site has a prodigious number of academic articles on this subject, and he is the author of 8 academic books. His articles on Russia Insider have been very popular because of their solid supporting research and unique perspective. You can find a full archive of them here. Please support him on Patreon, as we do, where he describes his work as ‘An electronic Molotov cocktail thrown into the faculty meeting of the tenured American professor.’ Hear, hear!

 

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