Watchdog

MOSCOW (Reuters) -- A Russian journalist says he fears for his life and has gone into hiding after angering a nationalist pro-Kremlin youth group by writing an article criticizing Russia's Soviet past.

Aleksandr Podrabinek says he has received threats after publishing an editorial on the Internet about a Moscow restaurant changing its name from "Anti-Soviet" under pressure from local officials who said it was offensive to "Soviet veterans."

The article on ej.ru recalled the prison camps and crimes of Stalinism, and accused the current Russian authorities of trying to burnish the image of the Soviet Union.

Podrabinek, a former anticommunist dissident and freelance journalist, has since been criticized by Nashi, a nationalist youth movement that began under former President Vladimir Putin.

"I have received information from reliable sources that at a senior level the decision has been taken to settle scores with me by any means," he wrote in a blog post late on September 28, his first comment since going to ground several days ago.

"For the time being, in the interests of security, I am limiting my contact," he said.

Aleksandr Podrabinek

'Defiling The Honor'

Nashi said on September 28 it would picket Podrabinek's Moscow's home, accusing him according to Interfax news agency of "defiling the honor of veterans of the Great Patriotic War," the name by which Russians refer to World War II.

Nashi denies threatening Podrabinek, but demands an apology. It styles itself as a democratic, antifascist movement but has been accused by critics of engaging in harassment and intimidation.

New York-based press watchdog the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) ranks Russia the world's third most dangerous country for journalists, with 17 killed since 2000 including Kremlin critic Anna Politkovskaya in 2006.

Paris-based Reporters Without Borders on September 27 called for an end to the "hate campaign."

"The authorities must appeal for calm and curb this outburst of fury," the press watchdog said. "A man's life and respect for free expression in Russia are both at stake."

"This episode highlights how difficult it is in Russia today to challenge the official version of what happened during the Soviet era," it said in a press release.

Critics accuse Russia's leadership of trying to rehabilitate Soviet history, glossing over Stalinist mass deportations, gulag labor camps, and repressions in order to strengthen a sense of patriotism.

In his article, Podrabinek wrote that the Soviet past was "bloody, false, and shameful."

"The Soviet Union was not that country you portrayed in school textbooks and your lying media," he said.

The Moscow grill restaurant changed its name to "Soviet" earlier this month, saying it had been threatened with a fine.

MOSCOW (Reuters) -- Russia has ignored a series of judgments by the European Court of Human Rights on Chechnya, fueling a cycle of violence in the North Caucasus, a prominent rights watchdog has said.

The New York-based Human Rights Watch said not a single perpetrator had been brought to justice despite court judgments naming individuals directly involved in disappearances, extrajudicial executions, and torture.

The cases relate to violations during Russian military and intelligence operations in Chechnya from 1999 to 2004.

Rights groups accuse pro-Kremlin Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov of ruling effectively since 2004 with a climate of fear to keep control over the mainly Muslim region on Russia's southern flank, where Moscow has fought two wars against separatists in the past 15 years.

An increase in suicide bombs and attacks on security forces in Chechnya and neighbouring Ingushetia this year is challenging Moscow's grip on the region. A number of human rights and charity activists have also been shot dead.

Beyond paying compensation and legal fees under the court's rulings, Russia had failed to fully implement the judgments, ensure effective investigations and hold perpetrators accountable, the group said in a report.

"Full implementation is crucial to prevent abuses from recurring in Chechnya and in other parts of Russia's troubled North Caucasus."

"It carries perhaps the single most significant potential to produce lasting improvements in the human rights situation in this region."

Russian officials were not available for comment.

The report identified Russia's failure to provide access to criminal case files, delays in investigation and legal obstacles preventing investigators from accessing evidence held by Russian military or security services.

It cited examples of the detention of Chechen men by Russian security forces and their subsequent disappearance with little or no investigation into their fate.

"In numerous judgments on cases from Chechnya, the European Court found that the Russian authorities failed to effectively investigate even very strong leads or evidence indicating official involvement in human rights violations," the report said.