The Ministry of Justice put the song with criticism of Putin on a par with the justification of Nazism

The Ministry of Justice on November 23 updated the list of extremist materials. It includes six songs, a clip, a book and a poem. The texts of some of them describe the cooperation of the Cossacks with the Nazis (Hitlerite Germany) during the Great Patriotic War. Most of the prohibited materials relate to Cossack collaborationism, despite the fact that the perpetuation of the memory of the Cossacks who died during the war, including among collaborators, was not banned until recently. For example, carried out funeral ceremonies for the Cossacks who served in the SS cavalry corps. The same list includes a song about the modern impoverishment of the people with criticism of Vladimir Putin.

The list of extremist materials includes:

• Video recording Volunteer – “Lokotskaya Rus”
• Audio recording “Dagaz – Song of Cossack volunteers”
• Audio recording “TIR-Leon Degrel”
• Audio recording “Holdaar – Helmut von Pannwitz”
• Martha Hillers’ book “Woman in Berlin. Diary – from April 20 to June 22, 1945 “
• The song of the “Pornofilmy” group “Kill the Beggars!”
• Audio recording of the group “INTOLEANT” entitled “Kill Them All”
• Song of the right-wing radical group “RGD 88” – “Timur”
• Poem and song “Our whole life is just a spark In the flame of a powerful fire.”

Lyrics “Lokotskaya Rus” praises Nazism and the SS troops, about which “the free wind over Elbow bears the memory.” From July 1942 to August 1943, in the Oryol region near the village of Lokot, Nazi Germany created a semi-autonomous region “Lokot self-government”. Autonomy was to serve as a test for the Russian collaborationist government under the SS at the Reichskommissariat of Muscovy. After the evacuation from the territory of the Soviet authorities, dispossessed and exiled during the period of collectivization with anti-Soviet sentiments returned there. In the region, police detachments were formed, they were led by a local engineer Konstantin Voskoboynik, who received the post of chief burgomaster with the arrival of the Nazis. Under his command, with the permission of the Germans, a “local self-defense” was organized. Voskoboinik was killed by partisans, and some of the local residents were shot for his death. Later, the self-defense detachments expanded to the Russian Liberation People’s Army, which carried out mass killings of Soviet partisans. The famous “Tonka-machine-gunner” was in the service of “Lokotskaya Rus” – the executioner Antonina Makarova, who, according to the verdict, shot 168 people (these are those who were identified), mostly Soviet partisans and civilians.

One of the performers of the song “Lokotskaya Rus” is the Dagaz group. Another song from the group’s repertoire is “Song of Cossack Volunteers” – Similarly, it was included in the update of the register of extremist materials. The text of the song actually not only justifies, but also praises in a positive way Cossack collaboration – the cooperation of the Cossacks with the administration of Nazi Germany during the Second World War. Adolf Hitler considered the Cossacks to be the descendants of the Ostrogoths, who “by blood” are closer to the Aryans than to the Slavs, and actively created and used their formations on the territory of the USSR.

In addition, the TIR song was added to the list – Leon Degrel, telling about the “exploits” of the Belgian Degrel, the commander of the 28th SS Volunteer Division “Wallonia” and the owner of the Knight’s Cross of the Iron Cross. The song contains lines about how Degrel received the Knight’s Cross with an oak leaf “from his hands” and how this someone is important and carries the truth. Apparently, we are talking about Adolf Hitler, who personally presented the Order to Degrel with the words: “I have no son. But if I had him, I would like him to be the same as you. ” The “virtue” of the SS is opposed by a certain “monster” that “creeps from the east” with the fruits of Bolshevism.

The song Holdaar is also recognized as extremist – Helmut von Pannwitz, which praises the German military leader, who formed the collaborationist organization “Cossack Stan” on the instructions of the high command of the German army. Von Pannwitz in 1942 commanded a combined military unit as part of the 4th Tank Army of the Wehrmacht during the repulsion of the Soviet offensive in the Kotelnikovo area. For these battles, Von Pannfitz received the “Oak Leaves” for the Hitlerite Knight’s Cross.

Despite the fact that the Ministry of Justice considers the song about Von Pannwitz’s “exploits” extremist, in 1998 a memorial was erected at the Temple of All Saints in the north of Moscow under the name “To the soldiers of the Russian general military union, the Russian corps, the Cossack camp, the Cossacks of the 15th cavalry corps who fell for faith and fatherland. It was dedicated to Helmut von Pannwitz, Andrei Shkuro, Peter Krasnov, Sultan Klych-Girey, Timofey Domanov and other representatives of the Cossack formations of the Wehrmacht. All of the above are the atamans of the 15th SS Cossack Cavalry Corps. The monument was erected a year after the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation recognized all five as reasonably convicted and not subject to rehabilitation.

Later, in 2004, a mourning ceremony and church commemoration of the members of this formation took place. The organizers said that in this way they honor the memory of the Cossacks who fled with the Germans and their family members, forcibly extradited to the Soviet by the British government at the end of the war. In 2008, ataman Viktor Vodolatsky, a State Duma deputy from United Russia, signed an order to create a working group for the political rehabilitation of Ataman Krasnov. In April 2020, TV presenter, head of the state media holding “Russia Today” Dmitry Kiselev statedthat Peter Krasnov needs to erect a monument. Nobody accused Kiselev of justifying Nazism either.

As in the case of the memorial plate in honor of Karl Mannerheim, this monument was repeatedly broken. It was last damaged before Victory Day in 2007. Then the police opened a criminal case under the article “Vandalism”. After that, the stove was replaced by removing the names. Now the monument is dedicated to “the Cossacks who fell for the faith, the tsar and the fatherland in the First World War, conflicts and wars of the XX century”.