Russian Imperial Movement

The Russian Imperial Movement (RIM; Russian: Русское Имперское Движениe, romanized Russkoe imperskoe dvizhenie, RID)[1] is a Russian ultranationalist,[2] far-right paramilitary organisation.[3] RIM is based in Saint Petersburg and their leader is Stanislav Vorobyev.[3]

RIM is part of a broader cluster of extreme-right "political Orthodoxy" groups in Russia that promote monarchy, extol Russia's tsarist past, and draw inspiration from the violent, antisemitic Black Hundreds.[1] Others within the movement include the groups "For Faith and Fatherland" and the modern revival of the "Union of the Russian People."[1] Websites connected to RIM espouse antisemitism.[1]

In 2008, RIM formed its paramilitary branch, called the Imperial Legion. The group maintains two training facilities in Saint Petersburg.[2] After the War in Donbass broke out in eastern Ukraine in April 2014, the RIM began training and sending volunteer soldiers to the pro-Russian groups in the conflict in July.[3] Some members of the Imperial Legion have also worked as mercenaries in the Middle East and North Africa. On January 30, 2020, it was reported that Vladimir Skopinov, who had also previously fought in Donbass and Syria, died in Libya. He was the second member of the Legion to die in Libya.[4]

On 6 April 2020, the U.S. Department of State added the Russian Imperial Movement and three of its leaders (Stanislav Anatolyevich Vorobyev, Denis Valliullovich Gariyev, and Nikolay Nikolayevich Trushchalov) to the Specially Designated Global Terrorist list,[5] making it the first white supremacist group to be designated a terrorist organisation by the U.S. State Department.[2]

Outside of Russia

In 2008, RIM visited Sweden to attend Karl XII's Memorial Day in Stockholm together with the neo-Nazi Party of the Swedes. In the fall of 2015, it was noted that RIM had provided support to the Nazi organisation Swedish Resistance Movement (SMR), and that RIM's leader Vorobyev had visited SMR in Sweden.[3]

On January 26, 2020, a Russian man named Anatoly Udodov was arrested at the Arlanda airport after the police had discovered a cache of weapons belonging to him. The Swedish police had confiscated numerous firearms from him the previous summer due to his connections to SMR. Udodov was describe as the representative of RIM in Sweden by Vorobyev and investigators believe he is the local recruiter for the RIM training camps. According to Swedish police Udodov is friends with a convicted terrorists, 23-year-old Viktor Melin. Melin was part of a group of Swedish neo-Nazis who went to Russia for military training, and upon returning was responsible for a string of bombings against minorities and political enemies.[6] RIM has also provided paramilitary training to German, Polish and Finnish neo-nazis.[7]

Outside of Scandinavia, RIM is affiliated with the Black-Yellow Alliance of Austria and on November 9, 2019 Vorobyev was invited and took part in the congress of the organisation held in Parkhotel Schönbrunn, a guest house for the palace of Emperor Franz Joseph I.[8] The same month a representative of RIM held a speech in an international conference in Madrid organised by National Democracy and attended by the members of Alliance for Peace and Freedom.[9] Both groups have been characterized as neo-nazi. In May 2018, German Junge Nationaldemokraten organised a gathering in Riesa and representatives of RIM took part together with other similar organisations such as the neo-nazi Serbian Action and Bulgarian National Union.[10]

On 29 April 2020, the Spanish Ministry of the Interior received an intelligence report that stated RIM was inciting its right-wing extremist contacts in Spain to commit acts of terror, such as attacking the infrastructure, transportation system and using chemical weapons against the public.[11]

On 5 June 2020, the German magazine Focus reported that the German security services were aware of the training of German neo-nazis in Russia. For legal reasons, however, they could not prohibit the Germans from traveling to Saint Petersburg. The authorities assume that Russian President Vladimir Putin is aware of the camps and "at least tolerates them".[12][13]

According to an investigation by Infobae, a new Atomwaffen Division cell in Russia also allegedly receives training from the group, and United States citizens affiliated with the group are also believed to have taken part.[14]

References

1. Marlene Laruelle, Russian Nationalism: Imaginaries, Doctrines, and Political Battlefields (Routledge, 2019), pp. 167, 202-203.
2. John Hudson, U.S. labels a white-supremacist group 'terrorist' for the first time, Washington Post (April 6, 2020).
3. Nato: Främlingshatet kan gödas av främmande makt, Dagens Nyheter 2015-10-27
4. "Russian mercenary who fought in Donbas killed in Libya". UAWire. 7 April 2020.
5. "Designation of the Russian Imperial Movement". United States Department of State. 6 April 2020.
6. ""За Рассею пострадать хочу". Почему в Швеции судят националиста из СССР". BBC News. 7 April 2020.
7. "United States Designates Russian Imperial Movement and Leaders as Global Terrorists". US Department of State. 7 April 2020.
8. "Монархисты Австрии пригласили на свой конгресс главаря российских неонацистов". National News Agency of Ukraine. 7 April 2020.
9. "España, foco de la revuelta". Democracia Nacional. 7 April 2020.
10. "EUROPA – JUGEND – [RE]GENERATION.3. JN-EUROPAKONGRESS: EIN RÜCKBLICK". Junge Nationalisten. 15 April 2020.
11. "Un informe de Interior alerta de planes para esparcir el coronavirus y atacar torres de 5G". El Confidencial. 29 April 2020.
12. "Deutsche Neonazis werden in Russland militärisch geschult". Focus. 5 June 2020.
13. Pladson, Kristie. "German neo-Nazis trained at Russian camps: report | DW | 05.06.2020". Deutsche Welle. Retrieved 2020-06-05.
14. "Club Partizan, el campo de entrenamiento militar en Rusia para los neonazis del mundo (Club Partizan, the military training ground in Russia for the neo-Nazis of the world)". Infobae. June 14, 2020.