Suggested Link | Now to an unlikely alliance forged to fight the booming heroin trade in post Soviet Russia. A concerned father turned anti-drugs crusader and the local Mafia, a murderous bunch of racketeers. |
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| It's estimated there are about three million heroin addicts in Russia and in the Ural Mountains, gateway to the poppy fields of Afghanistan, the problem is particularly pointed. |
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| In one town a local businessman decided to fight back, cuffing up addicts for cold turkey and chasing down dealers with his band of volunteer vigilantes. |
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| He wanted a town without drugs - the local Mafia wanted to beat the law by grabbing political power. Here's Moscow correspondent, Irris Makler. |
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Heroin addicts being handcuffed to bed | Makler: These heroin addicts are going cold turkey. For the next two weeks they'll be handcuffed to their beds, and fed bread and water. There's no medical supervision. It's radical, even brutal, but it's a desperate grassroots response to Russia's exploding drug problem and its lack of treatment facilities. | 02:11 |
Young men shooting up | One man is determined to rid his city of scenes like these, and has taken the law into his own hands. Igor: We are just ordinary citizens of this country -- | 02:56 |
Igor | parents like others -- and we don't want this to happen to us, so we decided that no one else can do it except ourselves. And since the whole society is sick, we are supported by everyone. | 03:09 |
Raid on dealers | FX: Raid | 03:28 |
| Makler: These men are Igor Varov's vigilantes, targeting the dealers the police seem powerless to stop. | 03:39 |
| They call their crusade Town Without Drugs and it seems there's nothing they won't do to make their slogan a reality. |
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Map Yekaterinburg | Music | 04:00 |
Yekaterinburg | Makler: Once famous as the town where the Bolsheviks shot the last tsar, Yekaterinburg is now known for drug abuse. Yekaterinburg lies on the border between Europe and Asia. That may sound romantic, | 04:17 |
Makler Super: Irris Makler | but in fact its in the middle of the major heroin trafficking route from Afghanistan to the west. And as Afghanistan's heroin trade has increased, this town has seen an explosion in addiction and AIDS. | 04:33 |
Mother and son at clinic | Nurse: What did you use before heroin? Stass: Raw opium in the very beginning. | 04:48 |
| Makler: 21 year old Stass has been a heroin addict for five years. His parents are prominent locals - training Yekaterinburg athletes for the Sydney Olympics. They know that going cold turkey will tough on their son, but they say they have no choice. |
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Lyudmila | Lyudmila: We have no other way out. We have nowhere else to go - no one else can help boys like my son. This is why we hope the centre will do so. | 05:17 |
Stass in clinic | Mother: When shall we come tomorrow? Guard: Were you told to come tomorrow? Mother: No, we weren't told anything, what is your usual procedure? Guard: Usually we take him straight after the paperwork is done. Stass: Could I come tomorrow morning? | 05:29 |
| Makler: Stass injected heroin an hour before he came and he's tyring to buy one more day before he has to stop. But the rules here are strict. The treatment starts now. | 05:45 |
| Lyudmila: It was not a life, it was a nightmare - because I expected death every day and I knew my son was in so deep that as a mother, had no means to help him. | 05:58 |
Stass handcuffed to a bed | Makler: Twenty four hours later Stass lies handcuffed to a bed, and he's doing it hard. | 06:18 |
| Stass: The drugs are coming out... the body is in pain... I have a headache, I feel bad and weak. I don't want to live. |
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Detox centre | Makler: The centre has more than 50 patients sweating through their detox. But this is simply the opening instalment. Their parents have signed the boys over for a year. | 06:45 |
Sergei | Sergei: There is no other way. You probably know that after the hospital treatment only a very low percentage of addicts kick the habit. | 06:57 |
Boris | Boris: When you are chained you think differently. There's no such craving. You know you can't get away because you are chained. Makler: Are you hungry? Boris: [laughs ] Yes, very hungry. | 07:12 |
Igor in radio studio | Makler: Igor Varov is president of Town Without Drugs. It was becoming a father that made him start this crusade and he takes every opportunity to promote it. | 07:42 |
| Igor: I don't want to be a parent who tries in vain to treat his child and then cries on his grave. |
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| Makler: During this appearance on local radio, there's strong support for his methods -- though not from the medical profession. Igor stays after the show to argue with a sceptical doctor. | 08:03 |
| Igor: Come out and see us - when you come I show you everything. Let's not talk now, just come. |
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Makler interviews Igor | Makler: Your methods are pretty controversial how do you defend them? | 08:23 |
| Igor: In reality, there's nothing tough there -- we observe the human rights. If one comes and brings handcuffs and asks us to chain him to a bed for three weeks and feed him bread and water, we only carry out his wish. |
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Igor in car | Makler: Igor can handle flak from the medical profession. Doctors aren't dangerous -- but dealers are. This morning the police warned Igor that he could be killed, and his bodyguards are nervous. | 08:49 |
| Igor: If you stop there'll be no one to film. We don't stop for so long around here. |
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| Makler: The death threats from heroin dealers watching their business shrink. And Igor is uncomfortably vulnerable. | 09:23 |
Raid on dealers | It's raids like this one last November that have antagonised the police. Igor's vigilantes nailed three Yekaterinburg dealers and took a TV crew along to prove it could be done. | 09:44 |
| These tough tactics made Town Without Drugs into local heroes. |
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| And among those watching in awe were the Mafia, including Yekaterinburg's most vicious gang of racketeers and killers, Uralmash. |
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| Igor's men formed an extraordinary alliance, fighting drug crime with the help of these criminals. Together they faced down the dealers at a notorious trading spot, just by standing there, and refusing to leave for three days. | 10:15 |
Igor | Igor: We are grateful for the support, of course. They tried to stop drug sales at schools, and posted the guards there, and it was very effective because before that, cars pulled up to a school entrance and sold drugs right there. | 10:36 |
School | FX: School bell Makler: This is school 103 in the Uralmash district. Gang leader Alexander Khabarov regularly posts his men here as guards. And the head teacher says they help to keep the school drug free. | 10:56 |
Tatiana | Tatiana: The guards who work here are nice people and their work is good for the school. | 11:15 |
| Makler: Does it bother you that these guards are provided by the Uralmash gang? |
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| Tatiana: It is hard for me to judge. I am not interested in politics, and in this school we don't care about politics at all. We accept charity because the school needs it, but we don't go into details of such character. |
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School 103 | Makler: But Town Without Drugs was criticised for allying itself with the Mafia. They were exploiting the anti-drugs crusade for their own benefit. | 11:54 |
Khabarov campaign ad | Reporter: ...drug dens detected and shut down... thousands of children saved from addiction. Alexander Khabarov - man of action. | 12:04 |
| Makler: This was all part of the strategy for getting gang leader Alexander Khabarov elected to parliament. There, under Russian law, he'd be immune from prosecution for any crimes he'd committed. But Yekaterinburg's voters saw through such political opportunism. Alexander Khabarov failed to win at the polls. The people placed their faith in the police instead of the Mafia. | 12:17 |
Dalevski | Dalevski: Leader of the Uralmash group, Alexander Khabarov, said that they would impose order in their district of the city, Ordzhonikidze district, so that no drugs would be sold there. But looking at statistics of 1999 and 2000, one can say that the drugs are sold in the same quantities, which means they failed to stop the drug trade without the help of police. | 12:47 |
Mothers at clinic | Makler: Still the mothers come with their tragic children and Town Without Drugs continues to grow. | 13:25 |
| Mother: We should see how much it costs to build a bathhouse, maybe we can collect a certain sum and buy something. Igor: No, no sum you'll collect will be enough, You should ask factory managers to donate construction materials. Don't buy -- you must get the factories to give it to you. You will never be able to afford it. | 13: |
Graveyard | Music | 14:00 |
| Makler: In Yekaterinburg's most prestigious cemetery, gangsters lie side by side with generals and politicians. These ostentatious stones mark the graves of Uralmash's rivals, one commemorating what this thug valued most --his Mercedes key ring. This graveyard's a picture of priorities in the new Russia. It's the wild east, where murder and money are the path to power and respectability. But Igor Varov defends his pact with the devil. |
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Igor | Igor: I am not in the least concerned about it. I am more worried to make sure no one turns back. In many places, in many countries, it happened that people start fighting drugs and later, after gaining some money or political capital, abandon the fight, because of threat to personal security or something else. I just don't want it to harm our fight against drugs, that's all. | 14:52 |
Guys in clinic | Makler: Across the border in Afghanistan the poppies will soon be harvested, ready to supply another season of death and despair. | 15:40 |
| And for the victims in Yekaterinburg, these shackles may be the only hope. |
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Credits: | Reporter: Irris Makler Camera: David Martin Editor: Wendy Twibill Producer: Slava Zelenin |
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