Tajiks Found Murdered In Moscow

(RFE/RL) May 6, 2007 -- Russia's RIA Novosti news agency says two Tajik citizens were found murdered on a Moscow street today in what may have been a racially motivated attack.

The agency quotes an official as saying the two men, both of them manual laborers in a market, appear to have died from head wounds.

The official said that the investigation "will examine various explanations for the murders, including that of racial hatred."

Fifty-four people were killed last year in racist attacks in Russia.

(AFP)

Rising Russian Nationalism

Orthodox believers and nationalists heckling a gay-rights rally in Moscow in May 2006 (RFE/RL)

A THREAT TO CIVIL, RELIGIOUS LIBERTIES: Several leading experts told a briefing hosted by RFE/RL and the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom that several mounting trends in Russia are posing a growing threat to human rights, especially for members of the country's ethnic and religious minorities.