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For the arbitration request concerning the Eastern European mailing list, see Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Eastern European mailing list.
For another arbitration request concerning Eastern Europe-related disputes, see Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Eastern European disputes.
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Case Opened on 23:47, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

Case Closed on 18:08, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Case Amended by motion on 14:32, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Case Renamed by motion on 05:44, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

Case Amended by motion on 05:32, 23 October 2014 (UTC)

Case amended by motion on 00:50, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

Case amended by motion on 23:19, 17 February 2019 (UTC)

Case amended by motion on 22:19, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

Case amended by remedy on 16:30, 20 May 2023 (UTC)

Case amended by motion on 21:15, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Watchlist all case pages: 1, 2, 3, 4

Please do not edit this page directly unless you wish to become a participant in this case. (All participants are subject to Arbitration Committee decisions, and the ArbCom will consider each participant's role in the dispute.) Comments are very welcome on the Talk page, and will be read, in full. Evidence, no matter who can provide it, is very welcome at /Evidence. Evidence is more useful than comments.

Arbitrators, the parties, and other editors may suggest proposed principles, findings, and remedies at /Workshop. That page may also be used for general comments on the evidence. Arbitrators will then vote on a final decision in the case at /Proposed decision.

Once the case is closed, editors may add to the #Log of blocks and bans as needed, but closed cases should not be edited otherwise. Please raise any questions at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration#Requests for clarification.

Involved parties

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Clerk note: Above is a listing of all users mentioned in the CheckUser requests. (DLX and Digwuren)

Statement by Irpen

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Digwuren (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is a notoriously abusive POV-pusher and a fierce revert warrior with the record of gross disruption.

The case here is crystal clear. Without spending time going over details of his past disruption and block log (his last one-week block being not even a month ago) it is enough to take a look at Digwuren edits within the last 12 hours. There are a total of 93 edits.

Looking at the edit summaries of his reverts, one sees that he routinely accuses his opponents in vandalism and not by merely using the undo button, but specifically using the vandalism undo option in twinkle:

You are welcome to dig deeper to find more of the same. After the last debacle, he promised to solicit opinions from other editors to rectify the situation. The promise earned him an unblock but he failed to deliver on his promise. He was later reminded of it by an unblocking admin and promised again to rectify the situation with no result to this day.

A devoted revert warrior, he is as of the day of this submission, Aug. 14, 2007, one step under 3RR at Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya, Occupation of Estonia by Nazi Germany, and Alyosha Mirny and this is just the tip of the iceberg.

The disruption would not have reached the current level if he was not receiving a consistent encouragement and support from a small but well coordinated group of editors that feel sympathetic to his fringe POV. Judging from the past record, I believe this encouragement and support is bound to continue. What prompted me to submit this case for arbitration without further wait is the extent of disruption, meatpuppeting in edit wars, discussions of deletion, renaming or ANI, thus effectively bombing those discussions. Just today I noticed a fresh single-purpose account Ptrt (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) whose entire short activity consists of the support of Digwuren in edit wars followed by the immediate joining of the 5-edit old account to the ANI discussion, once the appearance of a new SPA was mentioned there.

The fact of multiple users editing from the Tartu University from behind firewall makes even a checkuser less than conclusive to sort out this mess. Immediate appearance of the familiar faces at any discussion, board, talk page, edit war that involves Digwuren is mind-boggling. There is also an undeniable evidence of the permanent line of the off-wiki connection among the POV-pushing (even legitimate) accounts as the coordination in synchronous revert warring, talk and board page postings is impossible to explain otherwise. Sure enough, coordinated posting will follow below.

Finally, there is an unprecedented fact of the complaint by the blocking admin that his computer faced the intrusion from Estonia-based IPs during the block period.

This is all too messy and complex for ANI and warrants a more thorough look by the ArbCom members armed with the checkuser tool and experience in dealing with POV-pushers of the most disruptive pattern. I did not even go into Digwuren's edits themselves, which are notorious for extremely blatant pattern of POV-pushing on all fronts, to save space as the ArbCom intervention is clearly warranted by the facts outlined above in their own right. I don't believe there is even a need at this stage to analyze content-wise this tsunami of POV-pushing while Digwuren's friends are to attempt circumventing the discussion of his disruption by presenting it in terms of some global content conflict. This is nothing like the much more complex in assigning faults and finding remedies Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Piotrus. The Piotrus' case involves top-notch editors from all sides dangled into their content disagreements and largely revolves around the notion of ethical conduct, also very important but much more difficult to judge or remedy. However, this case is about a clearly disallowed pattern of behavior spelled out very well in our policies and guidelines.

The mess of the egregious POV-pushing and disruption by Tartu-based accounts has got to be sorted out at last with:

  1. illegitimate accounts banned
  2. valid disruptive accounts placed on various paroles
  3. Digwuren receiving the punishment called for by the degree of the disruption caused by him.

If ArbCom has no way of determining the illegitimate accounts, still 2 and 3 above is within its purview if it agrees that the action is needed. --Irpen

Statement by Digwuren

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Indeed, as Martintg points out, this is a snowjob, starting from absurd accusations and misrepresentations, and ending in Bishonen's hypocritical attempt to present an RFC that she failed (on absurd premises) as suddenly valid now that it suits her cabalistic purposes. However:

  • I have never edited Wikipedia using computing resources restricted to University of Tartu, nor through any firewall operated by the University. If this arbitration case is about that university, I'm irrelevant to it.
  • The confirmation is bogus. Last week, exploiting the short work-week caused by August 20 falling to Monday this year, I left for a brief vacation. The first real notification of this whole RFAR was sent to me through email two days ago, and I only read it yesterday night, in a relatively inconvenient position. (I will not divulge the mail's sender's identity at this point, due to concern of bogus puppeteering accusations raising out of it. I may do so if he or she should explicitly agree, or confirm it if he or she should publically claim to have sent it.)
  • The "last 12 hours" section is just as bogus. First, such a period of time is far too short for any thorough analysis. Second, as should be obvious, I was relatively busy with off-Wikipedia affairs during these hours, leading to many of my edits being spelling fixes and other minorities about Soviet Union's cosmonauts. Third, dismissing "purely non-content formatting changes" belies hypocrisy on part of Irpen, as evidenced by this suggestion to his pet troll RJ CG (who, should it be relevant in any way, is currently blocked by ProhibitOnions, a completely uninvolved — and thus, presumably neutral — administrator)
  • Irpen's misrepresentation of [1] as "grossly offensive", [2] as "accusation of stalking" or [3] as "offensive accusation" are patently ridiculous.
  • As for non-repentance — I do not customarily repent when I'm being right. I may repent and apologise when I make a mistake, as happened in [4]. However, Petri Krohn's attempts to push his grossly incorrect — and offensive — alternative history ideas about The Holocaust to Wikipedia are clearly a deliberate attempt to violate Wikipedia's integrity; that is to say, vandalism. It is not different from a bored teenager spray-painting swastikas to synagogues, and it serves no encyclopædic purpose whatsoever.
  • As for Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Digwuren, I'm still preparing material for it. I have been rushed (as it turned out, on false pretenses and completely needlessly) into one RFC/U before; I certainly don't want to make the same mistake twice. There's a lot of material to work through, and it needs thorough analysis.
  • As for "devoted revert warrior" — thanks for noticing my devotion.
  • As for "fringe POV", this is yet another ridiculous claim. All content I have added to Wikipedia's mainspace comes from either WP:RS or is common knowledge. This has been elaborated by other users above, so I do not go into details here. If I would, I should refer to material gathered for the above-mentioned RFC, and as mentioned above, there's quite a lot of it.
  • Ptrt appears to belong to an established personality in Estonian Usenet, whose first name is probably 'Peeter'. He has mostly been active in newsgroups I haven't been in, so I don't know anything further about him; this has been gleaned from two simple Google searches.
  • FayssalF's story about cyber-attacks is revolting. It is not only a ridiculous accusation (first, the only thing I, as a non-administrator, can know about FayssalF's laptop — such knowledge being needed for such an attack — is that there's a good chance it's somewhere in or near Morocco, and that only because FayssalF declares on his userpage that he's in Morocco; second, there would be nothing to gain for me by such an attack, and third, I haven't been to Tallinn since May), but with me being a contributor to the article on Cyberattacks on Estonia 2007, this is an attack on my integrity; an accusation of my engaging in hypocrisy. I know for a fact that FayssalF can not back his accusation up with any evidence, thus, I expect him to either apologise, or the Arbitration Committee to strongly rebuke him. (There's another issue of FayssalF's weird ideas regarding me, but I expect to raise that in the upcoming RFC, so I won't detail it here.)
  • As for off-wiki communication, I would point out Petri Krohn's hypocrisy. From the sudden style change in RJ CG's contributions, and especially, their extent, it's clear that from about August 13, Petri Krohn has been feeding content to RJ CG for inclusion in Wikipedia; possibly related to this call for off-wiki communication from 21 July. (I can't blame Irpen for not noticing this, though, as it can be reasonably assumed that he is not familiar with RJ CG's previous style, or, being non-native English speaker, does not notice most of the subtle linguistic clues.) This kind of meatpuppeting to try and leave his own — once burnt — hands "clean" from a user so vocal about bogus puppeteering changes before constitutes hypocrisy.
  • As for JdeJ, I believe he's misunderstood the purpose of my comment, possibly through unfortunate word choice by me. I apologise for the misunderstanding, and point out that I have nothing against his person, or his good job in a host of other areas. His particular idea in question, though, is rather problematic. But this is not the place to work that out.
  • As for "disruptive users", very few of the users traceable to Estonia can be classified under that, and almost all of those are one-shot trolls, such as Gerog112 (who appears to have left once the Rein Lang affair got cold). None are those listed under the abusive RFCU incidents. I agree with Irpen that disruption-reduction measures are needed — very frustratingly, this has not been done on Baltics States related articles for a long time —, but his fingers are pointing to a wrong direction.
  • As per above and below, I strongly reject Irpen's peculiar notion that there's punishable disruption emanating from me. If he insist he's talking about a Digwuren, he does not know what he's talking about.
  • The comparison with the Piotrus' (whom I deeply respect) arbitration case is relevant, but incomplete, for reasons that do not belong here.
  • This RFC is important for another reason. Specifically, extra-political deletion of such a clear-case RFC, and accompanying comments made by Bishonen (to which I will not link, because I consider it too likely that she'll just delete the RFC again, leading to these links becoming red) sent the folks of WikiProject Estonia a strong message that there is no real way to deal with persistent and determined trolling on Estonia-related articles. For example, one of the currently most active trolls in these articles is RJ CG. Is it feasible to do an RFC on him? No, because no matter what people disagreeing with his continuous tedious editing do, it's not enough for Bishonen. Is it feasible to do other kind of WP:DR? No, because according to Wikipedia policy, the RFC step must first be done.
  • Because of this, I welcome this arbitration. (So has been Alexia Death, who is apparently quite sick from Petri Krohn's repetition of the arbitration mantra.) As seen by actions of Bishonen, this snowjob by Irpen is the only real way of achieving an environment even remotely conducive to collecting an encyclopædia. It may not be according to the policy, but life has shown that on Wikipedia, policy is for excuses, not for rules, anyway.
  • But the arbitration is thoroughly misrequested. As I have explained above, it is most certainly not about me. This arbitration is needed to sort out disruption in articles relating to Northeastern Europe, including the "Tartu University accounts" slur. If the Arbitration Committee fails to condemn that misrepresentation as a case of uncivil behaviour, I will consider it a personal WP:POINT of mine to refer to the cabal centered around Petri Krohn, Ghirlandajo, Mikkalai and RJ CG as "Cartel USSR Forever" in every relevant Wikipedia-related context. (Thanks for Erik Jesse for coining it.) I may consider such broad-brush labelling disdainful in my off-Wikipedia life, but Wikipedia will have shown that this is what it is about.

All that having been said, let's now go forward with arbitration. It would appear arbitrators have even been so forthcoming as to vote for accepting it even before I returned from my vacation. I guess it underlines my non-involvement. Digwuren 17:23, 25 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Alexia Death

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There have been threats of Arbcom from almost the very beginning I and other Estonians now labeled "Tartu accounts" or "Korp!Estonia" became active and I personally am sick and tired of the constant attacks, the accusations and the mindless POV pushing based an national level animosity of certain editors. It needs higher level attention, and it needs it NOW. Lets air this matter for good.

Lets get the facts straight
  • Editing from behind UT firewall allegation is false - I graduated from University of Tartu two years ago and have NEVER edited WP from its infrastructure or knowingly used its proxy. These claims are plain WRONG. I have never knowingly met any of the editors associated with me in his manner.
  • Accusations of "hacking" are dubious - To attack someone, Digwurren would need to know that someones IP. He is not an admin so he has NO ACCESS to that information. FayssalF is mistaken and owes Digwurren an apology unless he shows some proof. Otherwise the whole claim is slander. The recent clam that an obscure guess about his locations based on his public info proves anything is rather odd. I'm starting to SERIOUSLY doubt his IT skills if he keeps it up. Knowing that someone is in or near Morocco is about as helpful in mounting a cyber attack on someone as knowing that a particular person likes to wear blue pants in finding that particular person in a city of a million people. If FayssalF maintains that Digwurren mounted a cyber attack on him then Wikipedia must have a major leak or flaw somewhere allowing Digwuren to obtain his IP. Is he prepared to claim that?
Comment on Digwuren and his woes

I became active on Wikipedia pretty much on the same time as he did. I've participated in the same "battles". The difference between him and me is that I refuse to follow the examples set by opposition. With the constant name calling("extreme nationalist Estonians", "Korp!Estonia", "socks on wheels" - this I actually found to be funny), constant accusations of vandalism ... no wonder it has rubbed of on someone fairly new to Wikipedia. We tried RFC/U with Petri Krohn, but in spite the overwhelming amount of evidence, the case was rejected because, apparently we had not tried hard enough to make up. I believe this was the turning point of Digwurren. We had tried to do this right, but it did not work. Why bother with being good all the time if the system favors being bad? May it be noted that this is not an excuse, its a reason and as long as the rules are not enforced fairly and equally on everybody, there will be others leaning from current "role models".

Comment on now undeleted RFC/Petri_Krohn

The "outside" views are actually views of two camps that voting clearly displays. One side acknowledges that these views are really not outside, the other not. And then there are just plain racist slanderous slurs like this.I worked hard in trying to put it together and I was seriously disappointed with he whole process when it failed.

What I seek from this case
  • An end to the "Korp!Estonia" and "Tartu accounts" accusations.
  • WP:CIVIL enforced equally regardless of your edit count or other merits.
  • An end to ruthless Russian/Soviet POV pushing campaign in articles about Estonia. NPOV should be respected, views attributed and content reliably sourced. And all this needs to be enforced just like WP:CIVIL.
Extending Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Piotrus/Proposed decision to this case

If it is made clear that this case is also extended here then the two last wishes on my resolution list are handled. That would still leave the constant accusations of some form of "co-operation" between the "Tartu accounts" and the matter of unsubstantiated hacking accusation.

Last modified: --Alexia Death the Grey 09:26, 27 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by Erik Jesse

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I noticed this thread days ago, but thought it wasn't worth of a response. But now the “non-involved” Ghirlandajo has also started commenting and he'll certainly soon be followed by his admirers. As I won't have computer access for some days, I'll better say sth before taking a break. The so-called Korp! Estonia – existence of which no-one has proved, only assumed – is of course blamed here again. The meatpuppetry and Estonian conspiracy accusations have been quite ridiculous in Wikipedia context, for some time I thought they even didn't deserve an answer. The point is certainly not, whether some of Estonians co-ordinate their efforts by e-mail etc. The practice of co-operative editing, incl edit warring, however, is hardly founded by this alleged Korp!. One just look how certain Russia-related articles are 'edit-warred' - first you'll surely see Ghirlandajo there, he'll be joined by Irpen soon (how come that they find each other so easily?) When these two are there, A.Bakharev may join in with his admin tools. (Not to forget Grafikmfr, once a prolific author, who has sadly stopped contributing in fall 2006, but quickly finds, as if by magic, when his brothers-in-arms need his help at reverting or voting (this 'phenomenon' has of course been already noted [7]) I affirm once again, that to my knowledge, the Estonian users included in this arbcom request, are not personally acquainted and most probably keep track with others only by checking the contributions and the Estonia-related watchlist.
Now to Digwuren. I absolutely agree with Martintg and Sander Säde, who are much more experienced here. I'd add that I am not surprised at all that a competent user like Digwuren may sometimes over-react in case of provocations by his opponents. After all, if obvious vandals or trolls, proud blackhundredists (cf. this 'statement' !) or self-described National Bolsheviks are allowed to troll in Estonia-related articles, don't be surprised if one is sometimes uncivil when dealing with legitimate accounts or doesn't follow all the guidelines you have discarded long time ago. So that, first look into mirror, dear cartel USSR forever!, or how we're going to call you. Erik Jesse 06:02, 19 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by FayssalF

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I've got quite a clear evidence, which i'd be presenting to The Committee to look at it, re attempts of intrusion of my laptop back on late July 2007 exactly when Digwuren (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) was blocked by me for a week. I'll not in any case post them at the evidence page as it contains personal data and i am not silly to divulge it in public. What strikes me more is the way Digwuren talks about my location. I quote from their statement above: ...is that there's a good chance it's somewhere in or near Morocco... which is technically very very accurate. I do mention that i am based in Morocco but that's all. I've never declared that i also edit sometimes from a neighboring country even if it is true. Evidence of the places from where i edit would be shown to The Committee as well. So what led Digwuren to guess about that very particular fact?

Background

Well, in brief. I was the admin who blocked Digwuren back on July 2007 as well as 2 other users which i'd identify as the "other side" in what follows.

Timeline

  • On July 20, 2007, i've experienced some online intrusion attempts made against my machine (for what i could record, the experience lasted no more than a couple of hours). I've already got a C# userbox posted at my userpage. I am saying this responding to User:Suva's request to know about the IP in question. The problem is that User:Suva insisted in knowing about the exact location of the IP in question. I totally refused such request and said that's IMPOSSIBLE as long as [He] is not an ADMIN. I've explained to everyone that any admin can contact me to know about this issue. I declared many times that only an admin can get that kind of information and asked them to stop insisting. I've already explained that it was not my intention to talk about that but since matters arrived to this point then i considered it is right to talk about it.

Now i see that [User:Digwuren] is threating to file a RfC on me. No problem of course. What is odd is why Digwuren want us to wait until my potential RfC to talk about my alleged admin abuse. Isn't this the right place? -- FayssalF - Wiki me up® 07:14, 27 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Otto ter Haar

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I agree with the objections against the behaviour of Digwuren. I personally experienced his agressive and uncivil behaviour. He reverts promptly edits he does not approve without reacting on a motivation on the talk page. If he reacts his statements are rhetorical and often sarcastic. Otto 18:57, 28 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Preliminary decisions

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Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (4/0/0/1)

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Temporary injunction (none)

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Motion regarding scope of case

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1) This matter concerns all disruptive editing related to Estonian-Russian ethnic conflict, particularly those who edited regarding the Bronze Soldier of Tallinn controversy. Any editor reasonably believed to have engaged in disruptive editing may be noticed in and evidence may be presented regarding them. If evidence is presented regarding an editor, they should be noticed in.

Passed 5 to 0, 17:15, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Final decision

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All numbering based on /Proposed decision (vote counts and comments are there as well)

Principles

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Wikipedia is not a battleground

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1) Wikipedia is a reference work. Use of the site for political or ideological struggle accompanied by harassment of opponents is extremely disruptive.

Passed 7 to 0, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Courtesy

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2) Wikipedia users are expected to behave reasonably and calmly in their dealings with other users. Insulting and intimidating other users harms the community by creating a hostile environment. Personal attacks are not acceptable.

Passed 7 to 0, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Consensus

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3) Wikipedia works by building consensus through the use of polite discussion. The dispute resolution process is designed to assist consensus-building when normal talk page communication has not worked. Sustained edit-warring is not an appropriate method of resolving disputes, and is wasteful of resources and destructive to morale.

Passed 7 to 0, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Keeping one's cool

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4) Editors are expected to keep their cool when editing. Uncivil behavior by others should not be returned in kind. Casual allegations of poor wikiquette are considered harmful; such concerns should be brought up in appropriate forums, if at all.

Passed 7 to 0, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

At wit's end

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5) In cases where all reasonable attempts to control the spread of disruption arising from long-term disputes have failed, the Committee may be forced to adopt seemingly draconian measures as a last resort for preventing further damage to the encyclopedia.

Passed 7 to 0, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Findings of fact

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Locus of dispute

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1) The current dispute revolves around various topics in Estonian history—particulary post-World War II history—and is essentially a part of the broader long-term disputes prevalent over the entire range of articles dealing with Eastern European history.

Passed 7 to 1, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Alexia Death

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2) Alexia Death (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has engaged in a variety of disruptive behavior, including sustained edit-warring ([8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13], [14], [15], [16], [17]) as well as incivility, personal attacks, and assumptions of bad faith ([18], [19]).

Passed 7 to 0, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Digwuren

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3) Digwuren (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has engaged in a variety of disruptive behavior, including sustained edit-warring ([20], [21], [22], [23], [24], [25], [26], [27], [28], [29], [30]) and attempts to interfere with Wikipedia process ([31], [32], [33]), as well as incivility, personal attacks, assumptions of bad faith, and repeated attempts to use Wikipedia as a battleground ([34], [35], [36], [37], [38], [39], [40], [41]).

Passed 7 to 0, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Irpen and Piotrus

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4) Irpen (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and Piotrus (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) have a long history of personal disputes. Their interaction since Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Piotrus has continued to be confrontational.

Passed 6 to 0, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Irpen

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5) Irpen (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has engaged in personal attacks, incivility, and assumptions of bad faith ([42], [43], [44], [45], [46], [47], [48], [49]).

Passed 5 to 1, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Petri Krohn

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6) Petri Krohn (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has engaged in a variety of disruptive behavior, including sustained edit-warring ([50], [51], [52], [53], [54], [55], [56], [57], [58], [59], [60], [61]) as well as incivility, personal attacks, assumptions of bad faith, and repeated attempts to use Wikipedia as a battleground ([62], [63], [64], [65], [66], [67]).

Passed 6 to 0, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

RJ_CG

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7) RJ_CG (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has engaged in sustained edit-warring ([68], [69], [70], [71], [72], [73]) as well as incivility, personal attacks, and assumptions of bad faith ([74]).

Passed 6 to 0, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Suva

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8) Suva (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has engaged in incivility, personal attacks, assumptions of bad faith, and repeated attempts to use Wikipedia as a battleground ([75], [76], [77], [78]).

Passed 6 to 0, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Ghirlandajo

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9) Ghirlandajo (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has engaged in personal attacks, incivility, and assumptions of bad faith ([79], [80], [81], [82], [83], [84]).

Passed 5 to 1, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Sander Säde

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10) Sander Säde (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), formerly editing as DLX (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), has engaged in incivility, personal attacks, and assumptions of bad faith ([85], [86], [87], [88], [89], [90], [91]).

Passed 5 to 0, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Remedies

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Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

Digwuren banned

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2) Digwuren (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is banned from Wikipedia for a period of one year.

Passed 6 to 0, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Petri Krohn banned

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5) Petri Krohn (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is banned from Wikipedia for a period of one year.

Passed 6 to 0, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Editors warned

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8) All editors are warned that future attempts to use Wikipedia as a battleground—in particular, by making generalized accusations that persons of a particular national or ethnic group are engaged in Holocaust denial or harbor Nazi sympathies—may result in the imposition of summary bans when the matter is reported to the Committee. This applies both to the parties to this case as well as to any other editor that may choose to engage in such conduct.

Passed 6 to 0, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

General restriction

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11) Any editor working on topics related to Eastern Europe, broadly defined, may be made subject to an editing restriction at the discretion of any uninvolved administrator. The restriction shall specify that, should the editor make any edits which are judged by an administrator to be uncivil, personal attacks, or assumptions of bad faith, he may be blocked for the duration specified in the enforcement ruling below. Before the restriction shall come into effect for a particular editor, that editor shall be given an official notice of it with a link to this decision.

Passed 7 to 1, 18:06, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
Superseded by an alternate sanction, 01:55, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Contentious topic designation

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12) Eastern Europe and the Balkans, broadly construed, is designated as a contentious topic.

Passed 6-1-1 by motion, 01:55, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
Amended 4 to 0 by motion, 14:32, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
Amended 7 to 1 by Motion, 05:32, 23 October 2014 (UTC)
Amended by motion at 23:19, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
Amended 10 to 0 with 1 abstention by motion at 21:36, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

Reliable source consensus-required restriction

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x) All articles and edits in the topic area of Lithuania history during World War II (1933-1945) and the history of Jews in Lithuania are subject to a "reliable source consensus-required restriction."

Adopted motion at 21:15, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Enforcement

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Enforcement of restrictions

0) Should any user subject to a restriction in this case violate that restriction, that user may be blocked, initially for up to one month, and then with blocks increasing in duration to a maximum of one year.

In accordance with the procedure for the standard enforcement provision adopted 3 May 2014, this provision did not require a vote.

Appeals and modifications

0) Appeals and modifications

This procedure applies to appeals related to, and modifications of, actions taken by administrators to enforce the Committee's remedies. It does not apply to appeals related to the remedies directly enacted by the Committee.

Appeals by sanctioned editors

Appeals may be made only by the editor under sanction and only for a currently active sanction. Requests for modification of page restrictions may be made by any editor. The process has three possible stages (see "Important notes" below). The editor may:

  1. ask the enforcing administrator to reconsider their original decision;
  2. request review at the arbitration enforcement noticeboard ("AE") or at the administrators’ noticeboard ("AN"); and
  3. submit a request for amendment at "ARCA". If the editor is blocked, the appeal may be made by email through Special:EmailUser/Arbitration Committee (or, if email access is revoked, to arbcom-en@wikimedia.org).
Modifications by administrators

No administrator may modify or remove a sanction placed by another administrator without:

  1. the explicit prior affirmative consent of the enforcing administrator; or
  2. prior affirmative agreement for the modification at (a) AE or (b) AN or (c) ARCA (see "Important notes" below).

Administrators modifying sanctions out of process may at the discretion of the committee be desysopped.

Nothing in this section prevents an administrator from replacing an existing sanction issued by another administrator with a new sanction if fresh misconduct has taken place after the existing sanction was applied.

Administrators are free to modify sanctions placed by former administrators – that is, editors who do not have the administrator permission enabled (due to a temporary or permanent relinquishment or desysop) – without regard to the requirements of this section. If an administrator modifies a sanction placed by a former administrator, the administrator who made the modification becomes the "enforcing administrator". If a former administrator regains the tools, the provisions of this section again apply to their unmodified enforcement actions.

Important notes:

  1. For a request to succeed, either
(i) the clear and substantial consensus of (a) uninvolved administrators at AE or (b) uninvolved editors at AN or
(ii) a passing motion of arbitrators at ARCA
is required. If consensus at AE or AN is unclear, the status quo prevails.
  2. While asking the enforcing administrator and seeking reviews at AN or AE are not mandatory prior to seeking a decision from the committee, once the committee has reviewed a request, further substantive review at any forum is barred. The sole exception is editors under an active sanction who may still request an easing or removal of the sanction on the grounds that said sanction is no longer needed, but such requests may only be made once every six months, or whatever longer period the committee may specify.
  3. These provisions apply only to contentious topics placed by administrators and to blocks placed by administrators to enforce arbitration case decisions. They do not apply to sanctions directly authorised by the committee, and enacted either by arbitrators or by arbitration clerks, or to special functionary blocks of whatever nature.
  4. All actions designated as arbitration enforcement actions, including those alleged to be out of process or against existing policy, must first be appealed following arbitration enforcement procedures to establish if such enforcement is inappropriate before the action may be reversed or formally discussed at another venue.
In accordance with the procedure for the standard appeals and modifications provision adopted 3 May 2014, this provision did not require a vote.

Amendments

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Discretionary sanctions

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Superseded by an alternate sanction passed 14 to 0, 14:32, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

12) Any uninvolved administrator may, on his or her own discretion, impose sanctions on any editor working in the area of conflict (defined as articles which relate to Eastern Europe, broadly interpreted) if, despite being warned, that editor repeatedly or seriously fails to adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, any expected standards of behavior, or any normal editorial process. The sanctions imposed may include blocks of up to one year in length; bans from editing any page or set of pages within the area of conflict; bans on any editing related to the topic or its closely related topics; restrictions on reverts or other specified behaviors; or any other measures which the imposing administrator believes are reasonably necessary to ensure the smooth functioning of the project.

Prior to any sanctions being imposed, the editor in question shall be given a warning with a link to this decision by an uninvolved administrator; and, where appropriate, should be counseled on specific steps that he or she can take to improve his or her editing in accordance with relevant policies and guidelines.

In determining whether to impose sanctions on a given user and which sanctions to impose, administrators should use their judgment and balance the need to assume good faith and avoid biting genuinely inexperienced editors, and the desire to allow responsible contributors maximum freedom to edit, with the need to reduce edit-warring and misuse of Wikipedia as a battleground, so as to create an acceptable collaborative editing environment even on our most contentious articles. Editors wishing to edit in these areas are advised to edit carefully, to adopt Wikipedia's communal approaches (including appropriate conduct, dispute resolution, neutral point of view, no original research and verifiability) in their editing, and to amend behaviors that are deemed to be of concern by administrators. An editor unable or unwilling to do so may wish to restrict their editing to other topics, in order to avoid sanctions.

Appeals

Sanctions imposed under the provisions of this decision may be appealed to the imposing administrator, the appropriate administrators' noticeboard (currently Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Arbitration enforcement), or the Committee. Administrators are cautioned not to reverse such sanctions without familiarizing themselves with the full facts of the matter and engaging in extensive discussion and consensus-building at the administrators' noticeboard or another suitable on-wiki venue. The Committee will consider appropriate remedies including suspension or revocation of adminship in the event of violations.

Uninvolved administrators

For the purpose of imposing sanctions under this provision, an administrator will be considered "uninvolved" if he or she is not engaged in a current, direct, personal conflict on the topic with the user receiving sanctions. Enforcing the provisions of this decision will not be considered to be participation in a dispute. Any doubt regarding whether an administrator qualifies under this definition is to be treated as any other appeal of sanctions.

Logging

All sanctions imposed under the provisions of this decision are to be logged at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Digwuren#Log of blocks and bans.

Other provisions

This provision supersedes the "General restriction" remedy, but does not affect any other provisions of the case, or any sanctions already imposed under the "General restriction" remedy.

Passed 6-1-1 by motion, 01:55, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Standard discretionary sanctions

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Superseded versions, later all superseded by motion

Articles Pages which relate to Eastern Europe, broadly interpreted, are placed under discretionary sanctions. Any uninvolved administrator may levy restrictions as an arbitration enforcement action on users editing in this topic area, after an initial warning.

Passed 14 to 0 by motion, 14:32, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Amended to change "articles" to "pages"

Passed 7 to 1 by Motion, 05:32, 23 October 2014 (UTC)
Superseded by motion at 23:19, 17 February 2019 (UTC)

Pages which relate to Eastern Europe or the Balkans, broadly interpreted, are placed under discretionary sanctions. Any uninvolved administrator may levy restrictions as an arbitration enforcement action on users editing in this topic area, after an initial warning.

Amended by motion at 23:19, 17 February 2019 (UTC)

To rename Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Digwuren

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The case Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Digwuren is renamed to Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Eastern Europe. For the new title of Eastern Europe, WP:ARBEURO and WP:ARBEE are created as shortcuts. For the purposes of procedure, the index of topics with an active discretionary sanctions provision will be updated with the new title, but previous references to the Digwuren decision do not require to be updated. The rename of the Digwuren case to Eastern Europe is only for clarity in reference, and does not invalidate any previous action or pending sanctions taken under the provisions of this case.

Passed 10 to 1 by motion, 06:09, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

February 2015

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On 11 February 2015, Coffee (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) blocked an editor relying on the discretionary sanctions provisions for Eastern Europe. As a discretionary sanctions block it was out of process as the editor had not been pre-notified of discretionary sanctions for the topic. Accordingly, the prohibitions on modification do not apply and the block may be modified by any uninvolved administrator. Coffee is advised to better familiarize themselves with the discretionary sanctions provisions before using this process again.

Passed 10 to 0 by motion at 00:50, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

Motion: Eastern Europe and Balkans scope (February 2019)

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Superseded by motion

At Amendment II in Eastern Europe, Eastern Europe is replaced as text by Eastern Europe or the Balkans. Remedy 3 in Macedonia is superseded by this amendment.

Passed 5 to 0 by motion at 23:19, 17 February 2019 (UTC)

Motion: contentious topic designation (December 2022)

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Eastern Europe or the Balkans, broadly construed, is designated as a contentious topic.

As part of the 2022 adoption of the contentious topics procedure, the Arbitration Committee adopted the following motion to re-designate existing discretionary sanctions remedies as contentious topic designations.

Each reference to the prior discretionary sanctions procedure shall be treated as a reference to the contentious topics procedure. The arbitration clerks are directed to amend all existing remedies authorizing discretionary sanctions to instead designate contentious topics.

Passed 10 to 0 with 1 abstention by motion at 21:36, 14 December 2022 (UTC)


Amendment: ARCA (May 2023)

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As an alternative to Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement, editors may make enforcement requests directly to the Arbitration Committee at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Clarification and Amendment.

Passed 10 to 1 by remedy at 16:30, 20 May 2023 (UTC)

Amendment (January 2024)

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Clerks are instructed to add a new section, entitled "Reliable source consensus-required restriction" to the Enforcement section of the Arbitration Procedures with the following text:

The Committee may apply the "Reliable source consensus-required restriction" to specified topic areas. For topic areas with this restriction, when a source that is not an article in a peer-reviewed scholarly journal, an academically focused book by a reputable publisher, and/or an article published by a reputable institution is removed from an article, no editor may reinstate the source without first obtaining consensus on the talk page of the article in question or consensus about the reliability of the source in a discussion at the Reliable Sources Noticeboard. Administrators may enforce this restriction with page protections, topic bans, or blocks; enforcement decisions should consider not merely the severity of the violation but the general disciplinary record of the editor in violation.

Remedy 5 of Antisemitism in Poland is superseded by the following restriction:

All articles and edits in the topic area of Polish history during World War II (1933-1945) and the history of Jews in Poland are subject to a "reliable source consensus-required restriction".

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Eastern Europe is amended to include the following restriction:

All articles and edits in the topic area of Lithuania history during World War II (1933-1945) and the history of Jews in Lithuania are subject to a "reliable source consensus-required restriction."

Clerks are instructed to link to the Arbitration Procedures in the two restrictions above and are empowered to make other changes necessary to implement this new enforcement procedure.

Passed 8 to 0 with 2 abstentions by motion at 21:15, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Enforcement Log

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Any block, restriction, ban, or sanction performed under the authorisation of a remedy for this case must be logged at Wikipedia:Arbitration enforcement log, not here.

Old log
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

List of editors placed under editing restriction

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Any block, restriction, ban, or sanction performed under the authorisation of a remedy for this case must be logged in this section. Please specify the administrator, date and time, nature of sanction, and basis or context. Unless otherwise specified, the standardised enforcement provision applies to this case. All sanctions issued pursuant to a discretionary sanctions remedy must be logged at Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Discretionary sanctions/Log.

List of editors placed on notice

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On 3 May 2014 Arbcom established a new method of notifying for discretionary sanctions which is explained at WP:AC/DS#Awareness and alerts. All notices given prior to the May 2014 cutover date expired on 3 May 2015. New notices are to be given using {{Ds/alert}} and they expire one year after they are given. No new notices should be logged here.

The following notifications are therefore expired, and kept for reference purposes only:

Expired notifications (show to see list)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

2008

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2009

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2010

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2011

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2012

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2013

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2014

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Log of blocks and bans

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2007

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Log any block, ban or extension under any remedy in this decision here. Minimum information includes name of administrator, date and time, what was done and the basis for doing it.

  • 18:36, 21 October 2007 Cbrown1023 (Talk | contribs | block) blocked "Petri Krohn (Talk | contribs)" (account creation blocked) with an expiry time of 1 year (Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Digwuren)
  • 18:36, 21 October 2007 Cbrown1023 (Talk | contribs | block) blocked "Digwuren (Talk | contribs)" (account creation blocked) with an expiry time of 1 year ‎(Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Digwuren)
  • Sander Säde (talk · contribs) blocked for 24 hours after referring to Ghirlandajo as a "liar and hate-monger."[154]Later, after his unblock request was declined, he issued a (possibly, "temporarily") goodbye message in which he spoke about how "some administrators behave like Hitler with adrenaline overdose"[155] (if there is ever an effective way to insult me, that works; but I think I kept my cool). I rollbacked that latest insult, and protected the talk page for the duration of the block. Will follow this up, if needed. El_C 21:25, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Alexia Death (talk · contribs) blocked for 24 hours for starting and refusing to stop the same dispute as above. It began with a revert war on Ghirlandajo (which Sander Säde participated in) involving a comment by Alexia which, responding to an encouragement note to the-now inactive Ghirlandajo to return, essentially said: 'well, I'm not looking forward to your return, things have been quiet without you; but all the best in real life.'[156] It was removed, and restored, etc., with much melodrama and innuendo ensuing. I urged Alexia Death to go do something else and to, especially, cut down on the innuendo, but she opted to revert war against myself,[157] at which point she was blocked. A great deal of combativeness continues up to this minute on the blocked user's talk page. For now, I'm leaving it unprotected. Protected for the duration of the block, since this user obviously failed to refrain from insults and insinuations. Will follow this up, if needed. El_C 21:59, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

2008

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Log of article-level discretionary sanctions

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  1. No editor may make more than one revert per week on this article (see WP:EW for the meaning of "revert").
  2. All editors with Eastern Europe-related sanctions are banned from editing this article and its talk page. For the purposes of this ban, these editors are all who have at any time been the subject of remedies, blocks or other sanctions logged on the case pages WP:DIGWUREN, WP:EEML or WP:ARBRB, irrespective of whether or not these sanctions are still in force or whether they were imposed by the Arbitration Committee or by administrators.
Notified via edit notice and talk page banner.  Sandstein  22:29, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
2014 Russian military intervention in Ukraine (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
History of Crimea (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
2014 pro-Russian unrest in Ukraine (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
  • Articles fully move protected until 04:55, 5 June 2014 (UTC) given the high profile nature of the dispute and that there has already been a move war (or attempted move war) on at least one of the articles. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 04:55, 5 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
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