Pussy Riot whipped by Cossacks.

[ENT]

... men in Cossack uniforms beating, pepper spraying band members
Attackers hit the women with batons, tore off their ski masks, the video shows
Police and Cossacks attacked them in Sochi, the group says
CNN is trying to get comment from Russian authorities

Sochi, Russia (CNN) -- A video released Wednesday shows members of the Russian punk band Pussy Riot being beaten by security officials in Sochi as they tried to film a music video at the port of the city that is hosting the Winter Olympics.
The apparent attack happened just a day after band members Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, as well as journalists and Russian human rights activists, were detained for several hours at a police station located just a few miles from the Olympic Park.

A YouTube video of the new incident shows band members arriving at the port, surrounded by photographers. The women don ski masks in front of a Sochi 2014 sign and, as they began to perform, one band member is immediately pepper sprayed at close range by a man wearing the traditional headgear of the Cossacks.
Some of the women are then struck with a baton before several Cossacks descend on them, shoving and violently removing their ski masks. One of the band members is thrown to the ground by the security men, who also beat a photographer. After the women were beaten and walked away from the port, the security men are seen on the video shoving and beating two other men.

The band said it was trying to perform a new song called "Putin teaches us to love our motherland" at the main port in Sochi.

'You sold yourselves to the Americans'
Uniformed Cossacks in traditional fur hats and uniforms have accompanied Russian police as a colorful addition to the massive security presence around the Winter Games.

Tolokonnikova said on her Twitter account that Cossacks beat the band with billy clubs and pepper spray.

Aisya Krugovikh, a member of the band's entourage, said that during the altercation, some Cossacks yelled that Pussy Riot members should "shut their mouths," adding "you sold yourselves to the Americans."

CNN has repeatedly tried to contact Russian city officials by telephone and e-mail for comment on the allegations.

Among those apparently wounded in Wednesday's clash was a Russian artist named Alexei Knyebnikovsky, who Krugovikh said was bleeding from the face.
Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina published photos on their Twitter accounts of bruises on Tolokonnikova's chest and a man with blood on his face "after an attack by Cossacks."

Tolokonnikova also tweeted she was at a Sochi hospital taking care of her husband, who she wrote had "lost vision" due to pepper spray from Cossacks.
The previous day, band members were detained by police, who said they were investigating a theft at the hotel where the band was staying.

Alyokhina and Tolokonnikova, as well as the journalists and activists, were released without charges, but they said they were beaten while in custody.

Pussy Riot: 'no reasons to be afraid' Pussy Riot: 'It is a system of slavery' Pussy Riot: We're not thinking of Putin

On Wednesday, Tolokonnikova's husband, Petr Verzilov, told CNN the band had been detained and questioned by Russian security forces three times during a three-day visit to the Olympic city.

"Obviously, they are trying to let us know that we're not welcome here," Verzilov said Tuesday in an interview with CNN. "But we treat Sochi as part of Russia and according to Russian law any Russian citizen can go anywhere."
In Sochi for protests

The band members were in Sochi to protest what they said was the lack of freedom of speech and to record the music video critical of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina had been imprisoned for nearly two years after being convicted of "hooliganism" and inciting religious hatred for performing a punk song slamming Putin in a Moscow cathedral and then posting a video of it online.
Since their release, just before the Olympic Games began, they have spoken to journalists about their time behind bars, describing the conditions as squalid and their treatment by guards as demeaning and inhumane.

A third member of Pussy Riot, Yekaterina Samutsevich, was released in 2012.
This month, other band members said Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina were no longer part of the group. But Verzilov said Tuesday that wasn't true.
Video shows Pussy Riot members beaten by Cossacks - CNN.com

[kingwilly]

Terrible bastards.

[Sailing into trouble]

Pussy Riot is much more sexy than Suffragette! Everyone thought they were nuts back in the day. Change takes many forms. At some point the straw that breaks Putin will fall.

[barbaro]

Russians are not Europeans. They're eastern pigs.

[VocalNeal]

Idoits on Youtube. They are Russian police with furry hats they are NOT Cossacks.

Cossack is an ethnicity, not a job.

[harrybarracuda]

The bloke that dressed up as one of them got particular attention I see.

[Bettyboo]

I think they made their point well, and the Russian 'authorities' showed the world how they bully and beat unarmed non-violent people.

[wasabi]

A BBC radio 4 report from our own correspondant reported before December that a large force of Cossacks where brought to Sochi and at that time they where used in clearing out foreign workers who had worked in construction.

[rebbu]

Idoits on Youtube. They are Russian police with furry hats they are NOT Cossacks.

Cossack is an ethnicity, not a job.

Yes Neal, Cossack is a etnicity. The Cosacks that CNN were refering to are security gaurds working with the police wearing Cosack hats.

[Sailing into trouble]

Never liked guys who wear fur hats and dance while bouncing around wearing puffy pants.

[Mr Lick]

This type of unacceptable behaviour from Russian officials no doubt will have FIFA wondering what adverse publicity lies ahead for the 2018 World Cup Finals.

It's little wonder that so many Russian girls want out when a damn good beating is around the corner. Either the men will need to lay off the vodka or Putin may wish to appoint his own photo journalists.

[DrB0b]

Hmmm, my post proving those guys WERE cossacks has been deleted. I've had more posts deleted in the last month than in the previous 5 years, I guess one of those with a grudge against me has finally made mod on the new TD. Meanwhile, here's pussy Riot's latest video, Whipping by Cossacks included.



And inevitably

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This type of unacceptable behaviour from Russian officials no doubt will have FIFA wondering what adverse publicity lies ahead for the 2018 World Cup Finals.

It's little wonder that so many Russian girls want out when a damn good beating is around the corner. Either the men will need to lay off the vodka or Putin may wish to appoint his own photo journalists.

Now, that's a possibility.

The only way he can control the free press is to bar them from attending, so yes, a Putin (and his personal committee) appointed press is most likely on the cards.

[ENT]

Thanks for that video above, DrBob.

[ENT]

In the interests of fully understanding who or what a Cossack is these days, this article may explain a little.



The widely distributed video of a beating incident, which left three Pussy Riot band members hospitalized, has raised questions about the role of the Cossack militia in Russia.

At least 10 Cossack militia members and other security officers beat members of the Russian punk band on Wednesday in Sochi, the Associated Press reported.

In the video of the incident, one Cossack member appeared to use pepper spray on the band members, while another whipped them.

The governor of the Krasnodar region, where Sochi is located, expressed "strong disapproval" of the incident, said Mark Adams, spokesman for the International Olympic Committee.

Origins

Cossacks' identity is rooted in 16th century Russia when peasants in the Moscow area were forced to work for lords in settled colonies. These peasants fled to the steppe, the grassland, in the south and formed their own colonies, said Catherine Merridale, a history professor at Queen Mary University of London and author of Red Fortress: History and Illusion of the Kremlin in an interview with USA TODAY Network.

The Cossack culture was warlike and proud, Merridale said..

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries of the Tsarist regime, Cossacks fought alongside the Russian armies, Merridale said.

"They were regarded as the most fierce and most talented horsemen," Merridale said.


Role today

But the identify of who is a Cossack today is not clearly defined.

"Is it an ethnicity? Is it a community? Is it a culture?" said Anna Aruntunyan, a journalist for Moscow News and contributor to USA TODAY. "It's all these things at once."

Some Cossacks say the people identifying themselves as Cossacks in Sochi are not truly Cossacks, Aruntunyan said.

"Some comments I've seen is that these Cossacks don't even know how to ride a horse," she said.

People identifying themselves as Cossacks today embrace a "racist, nationalist and anti-Semitic" worldview, said Ariel Cohen, a senior fellow at Heritage Foundation, who is a Russia specialist.

According to the state-run news agency Ria Novosti, the Cossacks are serving as volunteer security officials for the Olympics. More than 400 Cossacks arrived in Sochi in early January to help the police maintain order, the news agency said.

The Cossacks have a "semi-official" role in Russia and "sometimes carry out self-appointed vigilante police duties that are now becoming officially authorized in some parts of the country, including Moscow," according to Ria Novosti.

Their law enforcement role is not clearly defined and falls into a gray area.

"It's dangerous because it is not set in law and it is not regulated real well," Cohen said.

In December, Russian President Vladimir Putin said Cossacks could be more effective than police, but they still had to work within the confines of the law, according to RT, formerly known as Russia Today.

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