Russia: the rising tide of hatred - [Sunday Herald] Special Report: Russia's Killer Fascist Gangs Amid the crushing poverty, brutal forces have emerged and grown in the former Soviet Union: neo-Nazi skinhead gangs who’ll kill even young children in the name of race … and for kicks Hurshida Sultanova was just nine years old when she met her death at the hands of Russian skinheads. Out walking with her father and 11-year-old cousin in St Petersburg, Russia’s second city, the little girl was attacked by a group of about 10 “skins”, their faces concealed by scarves. The trio – originally from the former Soviet republic of Tajikistan – attracted the young men’s attention for one reason only: their dark skin. They were set upon in a city courtyard with a brutality that is becoming more and more common in Russia. First came the racial abuse, then the beating with chains. Finally the knives came out and the skins fell upon Hurshida. She was stabbed 11 times and died in front of her father, her young blood soaking into the February snow. The Russian authorities would have you believe such incidents are rare, but they are not. Russia, the country that helped defeat fascism and Hitler, is becoming a crucible of anti-foreigner hate. It is fed by crushing poverty, a lingering sense of humiliation following the collapse of the Soviet Union and by Russia’s bloody conflict in Chechnya. This month has been relatively quiet by Russian standards – so far. A Chinese student in Moscow was beaten unconscious with baseball bats by two men who stole his watch and mobile phone. Then there was the market rampage in Volgograd, the city formerly known as Stalingrad and the place Hitler met his match. At least 60 masked young men, armed with metal bars and chains, rampaged through the city’s central clothes market, which is staffed largely by non-whites from the Caucasus and Central Asia. The attackers wreaked havoc for about an hour, smashing stalls and beating traders. They left one market trader dead and 20 injured.