VZCZCXRO6962
RR RUEHDBU RUEHLN RUEHPOD RUEHVK RUEHYG
DE RUEHMO #3735/01 2121405
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 311405Z JUL 07
FM AMEMBASSY MOSCOW
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 2508
INFO RUCNCIS/CIS COLLECTIVE
RUEHXD/MOSCOW POLITICAL COLLECTIVE
RUEHLN/AMCONSUL ST PETERSBURG 4347
RUEHVK/AMCONSUL VLADIVOSTOK 2304
RUEHYG/AMCONSUL YEKATERINBURG 2601

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 MOSCOW 003735 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PINR SOCI RS
SUBJECT: GREAT RUSSIA PARTY PROTESTS REGISTRATION DENIAL 
 
REF: MOSCOW 3262 (NOTAL) 
 
MOSCOW 00003735  001.2 OF 002 
 
 
¶1. (SBU) Summary: Following the Federal Registration 
Service's (FRS) July 24 refusal to register it, Dmitriy 
Rogozin's nationalist Great Russia party has begun mapping 
strategies for getting on the ballot for the December Duma 
elections.  The party's Central Committee Secretary told us 
that the FRS's arguments for denying registration were weak 
and legally indefensible, and that the party was planning 
multiple strategies for overturning or by-passing the 
decision.  Options under consideration are a court appeal and 
a possible merger with an already-registered party of the 
same political stripe, such as Patriots of Russia.  End 
Summary. 
 
-------------------------------------- 
Great Russia Party Denied Registration 
-------------------------------------- 
 
¶2. (U) As expected, on July 24 the Federal Registration 
Service (FRS) denied registration to the Great Russia party, 
citing alleged errors in their registration documents. 
(Great Russia was founded on May 5 by members who had left 
the Rodina party after it had been merged with two other 
parties in the creation of the pro-Kremlin "A Just Russia." 
It filed for registration on June 25.) Party leaders noted 
that Great Russia's application had been copied verbatim from 
"A Just Russia's" registration application, which the FRS had 
effortlessly approved, and Great Russia leader Andrey Savelev 
had written a point-by-point rebuttal of the FRS rejection, 
which had been posted on Great Russia's website. 
 
¶3. (U) Great Russia Central Committee Secretary Sergey 
Pykhtin, a former Rodina member of the Moscow City Duma, 
confirmed to us July 30 that the denial had not been 
unexpected (reftel).  Pykhtin insisted that Great Russia met 
the minimal legal requirements for registration: it was not 
an extremist organization, it had more than 50,000 registered 
party members in at least 45 federal regions, and its 
constituent assembly had approved the party's charter.  The 
FRS letter had cited violations that Pykhtin said were 
impossible to confirm without additional information.    For 
example, it alleged that 135 people (on what Pykhtin said was 
a list of more than 60,000) had not actually applied for 
party membership, but it had not provided the names of the 
135 alleged offenders. Even if the 135 applications were 
ruled invalid, Pykhtin added, that would not invalidate Great 
Russia's application, as only 50,000 valid names were 
required by law.  In addition, the FRS had made no attempt to 
consult with Great Russia representatives before rejecting 
the application. 
 
---------- 
Next Steps 
---------- 
 
¶4. (SBU) Pykhtin told us that Great Russia would continue its 
efforts to get the FRS to reconsider its refusal, and 
Savelev's letter was the first step in that effort.  If that 
failed, Great Russia would file a legal appeal. Pykhtin said 
that while one appeal should be sufficient, Great Russia was 
considering filing appeals for each of the 60,000 party 
members disenfranchised by the FRS decision. 
 
¶5. (SBU) If legal appeals fail, Great Russia could merge with 
another registered party in order to get its candidates on 
the ballot.  The Patriots Party was the closest ideologically 
to Great Russia, Pykhtin said, but that issue would be 
discussed at a party presidium meeting on July 31. 
 
---------------------------------------- 
The Media and Ties to Nationalist Groups 
---------------------------------------- 
 
¶6. (SBU) Pykhtin said that Russian media had thus far covered 
the Great Russia registration story fairly, and had fully and 
accurately printed comments from the Great Russia leadership 
explaining their complaints against the FRS.  He lamented 
that the Western media had unquestioningly accepted as true 
allegations by organizations such as the Moscow Bureau for 
Human Rights and the SOVA Center that Great Russia was 
extremist, anti-Semitic, and racist.  "I think the Western 
nations make a great mistake when they fund these 
organizations that are looking for danger where there is 
none," Pykhtin said.  He denied that the Movement Against 
Illegal Immigration (DPNI), with which Great Russia 
cooperates, was racist or anti-Semitic. Participants in the 
2005 DPNI-sponsored "Russia March" who had carried pro-Nazi 
 
MOSCOW 00003735  002.2 OF 002 
 
 
signs and given the Nazi salute as they marched down Moscow 
streets were "provocateurs," he contended.  (Note:  Among 
Great Russia's followers are DPNI's Aleksandr Belov, Andrey 
Savelev and Yuriy Popov who have, at times, made anti-Semitic 
and/or racist statements.) 
 
----------------------- 
Rogozin on Great Russia 
----------------------- 
 
¶7. (U)  In the wake of the FRS's refusal, Rogozin has been 
everywhere in the print media, arguing both that Great Russia 
had been artificially excluded, and expressing his continued 
determination to advance an "ideology of national interests" 
which, he insisted, would in the end triumph.  Rogozin held 
little hope that the court would back Great Russia's appeal 
of the FRS's decision, but he thought that a large number of 
individual appeals to regional courts by those whose rights 
had been allegedly denied by the FRS might force a reversal. 
Should that fail, Rogozin reported that Great Russia would 
have recourse to "plan B," which would have party members 
seek places on the list of an ideologically-similar party. 
 
------- 
Comment 
------- 
 
¶8. (SBU)  All signs to date, however, suggest that the 
Kremlin is unlikely to allow Rogozin to find his way into the 
Duma via any of these routes.  He appears to be on the 
government-controlled media's "black list," and it seems that 
the Kremlin has decided that, if given a national platform in 
the form of a political party able to mine Russian 
nationalism, the charismatic Rogozin might be just too 
difficult to manage. 
RUSSELL