Mayor outside Chelyabinsk resigns following taxi driver’s murder and anti-Roma riot

The mayor of a town outside Chelyabinsk has resigned after a small riot last week in response to the murder of a local woman allegedly by a member of the Roma community. In a public statement, Korkinsky District head Natalya Loshchinina said state officials are well aware of the “so-called ‘Gypsy problem,’” and she lamented that her office’s efforts (which she described as a policy of “conversations and raids”) failed to convince her constituents that taxi driver Elena Manzhosova’s killer would be found and punished.

On October 24, police arrested 43 people who assembled outside the home of Loshchinina’s suspected murderer, a teenager in the town’s Roma community. The rioters damaged several cars and set fire to at least one house, throwing rocks at other homes while shouting anti-Roma and anti-police comments. The crowd’s total size was roughly 150 people.

Russia’s Federal Investigative Committee later placed Loshchinina’s murder case under the jurisdiction of its Main Investigative Department. Acknowledging ethnic tensions in the region, spokespeople for the agency said, “The issue of unlawful behavior by Roma residents in the city has been a long-standing concern for local residents but remains unresolved.”