Skinheads attack students

Published on Monday 1 December 2003 00:00

SKINHEADS attacked a group of foreign students from the People’s Friendship University in Moscow, injuring six of them, according to reports.

Viktor Ponko, the university’s rector, said the attack happened late on Saturday evening at a bus stop near the university in south-west Moscow. One report said that some of the students were taken to hospital.

Ponko told a radio station the attackers were between the ages of 15 and 18. He said nine had been detained but there was no police confirmation.

Echo of Moscow cited police as confirming the incident, but said that two teenagers were facing charges on suspicion of beating up a Jamaican student from the university.

Russia’s extremist groups have targeted immigrants from poverty-stricken formerly Soviet Central Asia and the Caucasus Mountains region, as well students and immigrants from Africa and East Asia.

The People’s Friendship University, once a showpiece of Soviet patronage of the Third World, continues to attract students from poor nations with low tuition fees.