Somebody Got Murdered: The Death of Olga Rukosyla

Olga Rukosyla was murdered by neo-Nazis on the evening of October 8, 2008, in Irkutsk

I first saw this face, these eyes (on this photograph) twenty minutes ago. Since then, I haven’t been able to stop shaking, although I knew beforehand that I would be seeing the image of a dead human being, a girl who was kicked to death by three Irkutsk neo-Nazis.

Life is such that, as you ride the bus or stand in line at the grocery store, you’re surrounded by people and their eyes. And sometimes you don’t feel like looking into those eyes. Because all too often those eyes reveal stupidity, thoughtlessness, indifference, and aggression.

But this case is different. I would be glad if I had an acquaintance, a friend or even a student like this. I would even be glad to have ended up by chance at a bus stop in Irkutsk and to have looked into these eyes just once.

But no, we were not destined to wait together for a bus and exchange glances.

Here is what Indymedia writes:

Nazis Have Committed Another Murder in Irkutsk

At around 10 p.m. on October 8, 2008, sixteen-year-old Olga Rukosyla was murdered in the Sinyushina Gora district of Irkutsk. Witnesses report that three young men dressed like Nazi skinheads approached her. The men asked her a question and grabbed her by the arm. Olga said something harsh in response to their actions. After this the men threw her to the ground and kicked her for several minutes. Passerby called an ambulance, which took the girl to hospital. However, she passed away later that same night.

Friends of the deceased say that Olga was not a member of a political movement, but that she did dress like a punk and wore red laces in her boots. Insofar as red laces are a symbol of the antifa subculture, and an alternative outward appearance often provokes aggression on the part of Nazis, it is likely that this was the reason for the attack.

The first suspects in the case are the Irkutsk neo-Nazis “Boomer” and “Def.” Both men are suspects in the attack on the eco-camp in Angarsk, in July 2007. Boomer is well known for his abnormal, aggressive behavior, as well as for collaborating with the police.

While the Nazi murderers and those who brought them up to act like this certainly deserve to burn in hell, this is probably too abstract a wish.

Retribution for their deeds should catch up with them while they are still alive. I somehow don’t believe that a state court will punish them. For the state prosecutors have let Boomer and Def out on bail once already. Perhaps they weren’t the ones who murdered Olga. But in any particular city there aren’t so many Nazis. That means their acquaintances killed Olga. And it was those same acquaintances, and, perhaps, Boomer and Def themselves, who killed Ilya Borodaenko during the attack on the ecological camp near Angarsk in July 2007.

It would seem that the only thing our police know how to do is to send two busloads of cops and two more busloads of OMON soldiers to escort one busload of mourners, as happened today during the funeral of Fyodor Filatov. Well, sometimes they also know how to nab murderers. But sometimes they let them go. But what the police or other state organs are definitely unable to do is prevent crime in general and fascist attacks in particular.

Maybe the time has come for society to show that we’re not okay with this state of affairs. I don’t know what this should look like. A demonstration that half the city turns out for? Barricades? Certainly not a pathetic picket on Pushkin Square. Let’s put our heads together on this one.

We pay our respects to the memory of Olga Rukosyla. We pay our respects to the memory of Fyodor Filatov, Alexei Krylov, Ilya Borodaenko, Stanislav Korepanov, Alexander Ryukhin, Timur Kacharava, and all the numerous victims of Nazi violence who fill this list every day, but whose names we do not honor and do not remember because for us they are faceless and nameless “persons of Caucasian ethnicity,” “migrants from the south,” or “migrants from the east.” No, all these people had names and have names. They all had mothers who brought them into this world. They all looked at this world and the people around them with hope.

Look into Olga’s eyes one more time. These are the eyes of everyone who has perished at the hands of the Nazis, no matter whether those eyes are blue, hazel or black. These are the eyes of each of us. For all of us are threatened while murderers freely roam among us.

−Vlad Tupikin. October 16, 2008. Moscow