Video still. Photo: Press service of the Krasnoyarsk Territory branch of the Russian Interior Ministry
On the night of September 23, security forces in Krasnoyarsk Territory carried out a raid on labor migrants attending a concert by Uzbek singer Jaloliddin Ahmadaliyev. The operation was reported by the regional Interior Ministry and by newslab.ru.
The large-scale raid took place at the “Korona” banquet hall in the settlement of Solontsy, Yemelyanovsky district, involving regional police, the Federal Security Service (FSB), and National Guard (Rosgvardiya) special forces. The stated aim was to identify foreign nationals residing illegally in Russia and to check for possible involvement in drug trafficking.
Around 620 people attended the concert, 210 of them foreign nationals. Security forces checked every attendee but found no banned substances or objects.
Footage released by the Interior Ministry showed numerous women and children in the hall. Rosgvardiya officers conducted document checks and searches using police dogs. The video also showed a group of men lined up in a tight formation and escorted out of the hall under police supervision, with several being forced into police vans.
As a result, 26 foreign nationals were taken to police stations for further processing and verification of their legal status. Preliminary information indicated that eight of them were in violation of Russia’s migration laws. Their nationalities were not disclosed.
Police drew up 19 administrative protocols: ten under Article 18.8 (“Violation by a foreign citizen or stateless person of entry or residence rules in the Russian Federation”), three under Article 18.11 (“Violation of immigration rules”), and six under Article 18.9 (“Violation of residence rules by foreign citizens and stateless persons”) of the Administrative Code. In addition, three criminal cases were opened under Article 322.3 (“Fictitious registration of a foreign citizen or stateless person”), the regional Interior Ministry said.
Uzbekistan’s Agency for Migration responded to the incident.
“The Russian office of the Agency for Migration under the Cabinet of Ministers has dispatched a licensed attorney to the site to protect the rights and interests of our citizens. An investigation is currently underway in accordance with Russian law,” the agency said in a September 24 statement.
This summer in Moscow, there were at least two high-profile mass detentions of migrants from Uzbekistan and other Central Asian countries. In June, security forces staged a harsh raid on a migrant dormitory, detaining several people on suspicion of migration violations. At the time, Uzbekistan’s embassy in Russia sent a note to the Russian Foreign Ministry requesting clarification and a legal assessment of the security forces’ actions. In August, 300 foreign nationals were detained during a raid on a hostel near Paveletsky Station for similar reasons.
