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S14 (Ukrainian group)

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S14
Formation2010
Headquarters3 Vasylkivska Street, Kyiv
Location
Leader
Yevhen Karas
Parent organization
Svoboda (former)

S14, also known as Sich[1] (Ukrainian: С14 (Січ)), is a neo-Nazi,[2][3] Ukrainian nationalist group founded in 2010.[4] In 2018, it gained notoriety for its involvement in violent attacks on Romani camps.[5][6][7] S14 claimed that it is only involved in removing illegal Romani camps using "compelling legitimate arguments."[8]

History

S14 was founded in 2010 as the youth wing of the ultranationalist political party Svoboda.[1] S14 was one of the far-right groups active during the Euromaidan movement (November 2013 – February 2014).[1] They were involved with skirmishes with the violent pro-government supporters known as Titushky.[1] In 2018, alongside the Azov Battalion's National Corps party, S14 was recognized by the US State Department's Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor as a nationalist hate group.[9][10] S14 shares the Azov Battalion's and Social-National Assembly's neo-Nazi aims.[10][nb 1] OpenDemocracy commented that S14 combines generic healthy patriotic message with "subtler hints which can be easily deciphered by members of the subculture (such as the symbolic date of the Roma pogrom on Hitler's birthday or indeed the very name of the organization)."[10][11]

In January 2018, S14 counter-protested the annual demonstration commemorating Anastasia Baburova and Stanislav Markelov, two murdered Russian anti-fascists, by shouting them down and attacking them with eggs and snowballs;[12] the demonstration has been an annual target of the far right.[11][13] In March 2018, Ukraine's capital Kyiv and S14 signed an agreement allowing S14 to establish a municipal guard to patrol the city's streets.[14] In June 2018, Hromadske Radio reported that Ukraine's Ministry of Youth and Sports was funding S14 to promote "national patriotic education projects", for which the group was awarded almost $17,000.[15] S14 also awarded funds to far-right linked Educational Assembly and Holosiyiv Hideout.[2] On 19 November 2018, S14 and fellow far-right Ukrainian nationalist political organizations, among them the Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists, the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, and Right Sector, endorsed Ruslan Koshulynskyi candidacy in the 2019 Ukrainian presidential election.[16] In the election, Koshulynskyi received 1.6% of the votes.[17]

Image

S14 (as spelled in the Ukrainian alphabet) says it resembles Sich (Ukrainian: січ), the name given to the administrative and military centres for Cossacks in the 16–18th century.[1] Experts and the Terrorism Research & Analysis Consortium have reported that the number 14 in the group's name has been seen as a reference to the Fourteen Words slogan coined by David Lane,[18][nb 2] an American white supremacist.[1][4][14] Academic Anton Shekhovtsov has defined the organization as a "neo-Nazi movement".[19] S14 leader Yevhen Karas [uk] has repeatedly defended himself from attacks calling him a Nazi.[1] According to him, his main "confrontations" were with "non-Ukrainian ethnic groups that controlled Ukraine's political and economic forces", whom Karas identified as Russians and Jews.[1] He stated: "We don't consider ourselves a neo-Nazi organization, we're clearly Ukrainian nationalists."[1] In 2018, former member Dmytro Riznychenko told Radio Svoboda: "C14 are all neo-Nazis. It's quite an appropriate definition."[18] In May 2018, Ukrainian independent media outlet Hromadske stated: "Most of C14's actions do seem to be directed at Russia, or those sympathetic towards Russia."[1] German political scientist Andreas Umland said that S14 "could qualify as neo-Nazi".[1] In June 2018, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported that members of the group had openly expressed neo-Nazi views.[5]

In 2017, S14 was accused by anti-war,[20][21] left-wing activist Stas Serhiyenko of having been involved in his stabbing.[14][22][23] The day after the attack, S14 leader Karas accused Serhiyenko of having supported the 2014 pro-Russian unrest in Kharkiv and the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea, and claimed that the attack was "far from the first, but not the last, attack on the bacilli of terrorism, hidden in the midst of peaceful Ukrainian streets".[24] In June 2018, S14 gained international notoriety after reports it was being involved in violent attacks on Romani camps.[5][6] After one such alleged attack in May 2018, Kyiv Police released a statement it had not receive complaints from Roma for beatings nor violence.[25] S14 responded that they have only used "compelling legitimate arguments" to remove illegal Romani camps.[8]

In August 2019, a Ukrainian court ruled in favour of S14 after a May 2018 tweet from Hromadske, which has appealed,[26] referred to the group as neo-Nazi.[18] After the ruling,[18] it published "The Neo-Nazis Who Don't Want to Be Called Neo-Nazis."[27] About Hromadske's response, Bellingcat said "[the] court noted that the information circulated by Hromadske back in May 2018 'harms the reputation' of C14 and ordered Hromadske to refute the information and pay 3,500UAH ($136) in court fees to C14."[18] The ruling was criticized by human rights groups, journalists, and both national and international observer, with the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe's Office of the Representative on Freedom of the Media expressing concern because it "goes against #mediafreedom and could discourage journalistic work" in Ukraine.[18] International news outlets like Haaretz,[28] Reuters,[29] and The Washington Post,[30] as well as the British Parliament and human rights organizations like the Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, have referred to S14 as a neo-Nazi group.[18]

Notes

  1. ^ "Its aims are stated in one of their online publications:
    • 'to prepare Ukraine for further expansion and to struggle for the liberation of the entire White Race from the domination of the internationalist speculative capital';
    • 'to punish severely sexual perversions and any interracial contacts that lead to the extinction of the white man'. This, according to experts, is a typical neo-Nazi narrative. C-14 holds roughly the same view ... ."[10]
  2. ^ Lane coined the 14-word slogan, which reads: "We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children."[4]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k "A Fine Line: Defining Nationalism and Neo-Nazism in Ukraine". Hromadske.TV. 10 May 2018. Retrieved 2019-02-11.
  2. ^ a b Cohen, Josh (20 June 2018). "Ukraine's Got a Real Problem with Far-Right Violence (And No, RT Didn't Write This Headline)". Atlantic Council. Retrieved 26 February 2022.
  3. ^ "Yes, It's (Still) OK To Call Ukraine's C14 'Neo-Nazi'". Bellingcat. 9 August 2019. Retrieved 26 February 2022. The Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, in an article published the day after the ruling, points out that C14 is 'considered by most experts to be neo-Nazi.' The Group points out that a number of experts and observers of the far-right in Ukraine frequently have referred to C14 as 'neo-Nazi.' These experts and observers include Vyacheslav Likhachev, the author of a 2018 Freedom House report on the far-right in Ukraine, as well as academics Anton Shekhovtsov and Andreas Umland.
  4. ^ a b c "C14 aka Sich - Ukraine". Terrorism Research & Analysis Consortium. Retrieved 2019-02-11.
  5. ^ a b c Miller, Christopher (14 June 2018). "Ukrainian Militia Behind Brutal Romany Attacks Getting State Funds". Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. Retrieved 2019-02-11.
  6. ^ a b "Ukraine Roma camp attack leaves one dead". BBC News. 24 June 2018. Retrieved 2019-02-11.
  7. ^ "SBU opens case against C14 nationalists for detention of Brazilian mercenary – lawyer". unian.info. Ukrainian Independent Information Agency. 18 June 2018. Retrieved 2019-02-11.
  8. ^ a b "На Лисій горі в Києві націоналісти розібрали і спалили табір ромів" [On the hill of Lysa Hora in Kiev, the nationalists dismantled and burnt a Roma camp] (in Ukrainian). 112 Ukraine. 22 April 2018. Retrieved 2019-02-11.
  9. ^ Gerasimova, Tanya (14 March 2019). "U.S. Considers C14 And National Corps Nationalist Hate Groups". Ukrainian News Agency. Retrieved 27 February 2022.
  10. ^ a b c d Engel, Valery (30 November 2019). "Zelensky Struggles To Contain Ukraine's Neo-Nazi Problem". Centre for Analysis of the Radical Right. Retrieved 27 February 2022. See also its PDF link at Civic-Nation.
  11. ^ a b Gorbach, Denys (16 October 2018). "Entrepreneurs of political violence: the varied interests and strategies of the far-right in Ukraine". OpenDemocracy. Retrieved 27 February 2022.
  12. ^ Hreys, Yevheniya (19 January 2018). "Члени С14 намагалися зірвати акцію пам'яті правозахисників Маркелова і Бабурової". Hromadske (in Ukrainian). Retrieved 27 February 2022.
  13. ^ Gorbach, Denis; Petik, Oles (15 February 2016). "The rise of Azov". OpenDemocracy. Retrieved 27 February 2022.
  14. ^ a b c Cohen, Josh (20 March 2018). "Commentary: Ukraine's neo-Nazi problem". Reuters. Retrieved 2019-02-11.
  15. ^ "Far-Right Group C14 Wins Funding From Ukrainian Government". Hromadske. 14 June 2018. Retrieved 26 February 2022.
  16. ^ "Націоналісти визначились з кандидатом у президенти" [The nationalists have been identified with a presidential candidate]. Ukrayinska Pravda (in Ukrainian). 19 November 2018. Retrieved 2019-02-11.
  17. ^ Nelles, Mattia (4 April 2019). "Zelenskiy wins first round but that's not the surprise". Atlantic Council. Retrieved 27 February 2022.
  18. ^ a b c d e f g "Yes, It's (Still) OK To Call Ukraine's C14 'Neo-Nazi'". Bellingcat. 9 August 2019. Retrieved 26 February 2022.
  19. ^ "From electoral success to revolutionary failure" (PDF). academia.edu. 2014-03-05.
  20. ^ "Волонтер рассказал об одном из "левых" студентов, бросивших тортом в замминистра финансов" [The volunteer told about one of the "left" students who threw the cake to the deputy finance minister]. unian.net (in Russian). Ukrainian Independent Information Agency. 31 August 2016. Retrieved 2019-02-11.
  21. ^ "Заява Платформа «Старт» про стипендії, наклеп та російський імперіалізм (заява)". rev.org.ua (in Ukrainian). Sotsialnyy Rukh. 7 September 2016. Retrieved 2019-02-11.
  22. ^ "В Киеве напали на участника "акции с тортом" против отмены стипендий" [In Kiev, a participant of a "cake action" against the abolition of scholarships was attacked]. Strana.ua (in Russian). 23 April 2017. Retrieved 2019-02-11.
  23. ^ "Interview: Leading Ukrainian Human Rights Activist Volodymyr Chemerys". Ukraine Solidarity Campaign. 5 February 2018. Retrieved 27 February 2022.
  24. ^ Karas, Yevhen (21 April 2017). "Чергове сафарі на сепарів" [Another safari on separatists]. Censor.net [uk] (in Ukrainian). Retrieved 2019-02-11.
  25. ^ "Крищенко: На Лисій горі під час суботника спалили сміття, а не табір ромів" [Kryshchenko: On the hill of Lysa Hora, garbage was burned during the volunteer clean-up, and not the Roma camp] (in Ukrainian). 112 Ukraine. 24 May 2018. Retrieved 2019-02-11.
  26. ^ "Kyiv Court Rules In Favor of Far Right C14 Group in Case Against Hromadske". Hromadske. 6 August 2019. Retrieved 26 February 2022.
  27. ^ "The Neo-Nazis Who Don't Want to Be Called Neo-Nazis". Hromadske. 6 August 2019. Retrieved 26 February 2022.
  28. ^ Colborne, Michael (4 February 2019). "Ukraine's Far Right Is Growing Increasingly Violent – Why Aren't Local Jews Concerned?". Haaretz. Retrieved 26 February 2022.
  29. ^ Cohen, Josh (20 June 2017). "Commentary: How Trump can show he's tough on anti-Semitism". Reuters. Retrieved 26 February 2022.
  30. ^ Cohen, Joshua (15 June 2017). "Ukraine's ultra-right militias are challenging the government to a showdown". The Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved 26 February 2022.

External links

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