DEFEND RUSSIAN HINDUS CAMPAIGN LAUNCHED
(18 January 2006)

The 'Defend Russian Hindus' campaign, is launched on 18 January 2006 by Ashok Kumar MP in association with the Hindu Forum of Britain, Hindu Council UK, International Society for Krishna Consciousness, National Council of Hindu Temples, and Vishwa Hindu Parishad UK. The campaign aims to build awareness about the persecution and discrimination against Russian Hindus by a corpus of the Russian Orthodox Church and the Mayor of Moscow, despite support from the Central Government. There are over 100,000 Hindus in Russia. In Moscow alone, there are 5000 Hindus of Indian origin and over 10,000 Hindus of Russian origin.

Two years ago the Mayor of Russia asked Hindus to vacate their temple in exchange for a piece of land on which they could build a bigger temple. After land was allocated to the Hindu temple, the original temple was demolished. The Russian Orthodox Church orchestrated mass protests against the allocation of land and started a misinformation campaign against Hindus in the media. Many Hindus were victimised, threatened, bullied, beaten and subject to violence.

On October 30th 2005, after bowing down to pressure from the Orthodox Church, the Mayor of Moscow cancelled the land order and took away the piece of land given for the construction of the Hindu temple. Now, the 15,000 Hindus in Moscow have no place to worship. The consecrated Deities of Radha and Krishna will have no home.

To add to this, around the time of Indian Prime Minister's state visit to Moscow to meet Russian President Putin, Archbishop Nikon, a leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, called the Hindu God, Lord Krishna an 'evil demon, the personified power of hell opposing God", and "a livid lascivious youth". The Archbishop further requested the Mayor to ban construction of a proposed Hindu temple in Moscow saying it would otherwise become "an idolatrous disgrace erected for the glory of wicked and malicious 'god' Krishna".

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