[independentmind]

Why don't you stick to the Nazi boards where your racism would be better appreciated. The Russian mafia in Russia is ethnically diverse with a very large contingent of Chechens and very few Jews.

Could you back that up? From what I have read, a large part of the Russian mafia is, in fact, Jewish.

[1rudeboy]

The original assertion, that the Russian mafia is "overwhelmingly Jewish," is the one that needs to be backed-up. Anecdotally, since a good portion of the Russian mafia are ex-KGB, does that mean that the ex-KGB was "overwhelmingly Jewish?"

[l33t]

You may be confusing Russian mobsters in the United States with the mafia in Russia. The former are predominantly of Jewish origin because Russian immigration to the US from 1970's to 1990's consisted mostly of Russian Jews admitted as refugees. Based on press accounts the activities of the Russian mob here do not extend beyond extortion, drugs, gambling, tax fraud.

[FormerLib]

Sure. This is from film maker Jos de Putter who went to Chechnya to make a movie. He quickly found out that he was not going to be safe unless he worked something out with the Chechen Mafia.

A journalist in London put me on the trail of Khozh-Ahmed Noukhaev, but my departure was so hasty that I only read an article about him in the plane on my way home. He was and still is the most powerful man in the Chechen Mafia, "a man you can only encounter with shaking knees". To my amazement, Noukhaev was interested in my proposal to make a documentary about it, on condition that it would also be about the people of Chechnya and their struggle.

Noukhaev invited me to come to Chechnya and I realised this was unique opportunity. With his protection, the chance of kidnapping was a lot smaller. It also struck me that Noukhaev's story was more than worth basing a documentary on.

In the eighties he had taken over the Moscow underworld while at the same time this man is regarded as a hero in is country, because he used the Mafia money first to set up an underground organisation and later to finance the war. Noukhaev was arrested several times, but always escape. He also looked like an actor playing a Mafia boss. Always wearing chic Italian suits, armed with a silver-capped walking stick, and moving around in an armoured Mercedes.