page_title: Alexander Prokhanov
section_title: Political activism
hierarchical_section_title: Alexander Prokhanov / Political activism
caption_attribution_description: Русский: Александр Андреевич Проханов беседует с лидером ополчения Луганской Народной Республики Алексеем Борисовичем Мозговым.English: Aleksey Mozgovoy, a Lugansk people's militia leader, discusses matters with Alexander Prohanov, August 7, 2014.
context_page_description: Alexander Andreyevich Prokhanov is a Russian writer, a member of the secretariat of the Writers Union of the Russian Federation and the author of more than 30 novels and short story collections. He is the editor-in-chief of Russia's extreme-right newspaper Zavtra, that combines ultranationalist and anti-capitalist views.
context_section_description: A controversial figure, Prokanov in Russia is seen by some as an original author sporting "a rare combination of mostmodernist ethics and imperialist agenda," and by others as a purveyor of extremist nationalistic views which formed the ideological platform of Zavtra, the ultra-conservative newspaper he's been the leader of since 1993. Fellow Russian ultra-nationalist Alexander Dugin credited Prokhanov with being "the godfather] of the New Russia opposition movement" even if deploring his refusal to take a more active part in it and choosing instead to back up political figures Dugin referred to as "the Staraya Square monsters".
  In 1991, during the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic presidential election, Prokhanov worked for the campaign of General Albert Makashov, an ultra-conservative candidate. In September 1992, Prokhanov was one of the initiators of the National Salvation Front, of which— until April 1994— he was a co-chairman. In September 1994, as one of the organizers of the All-Russian Congress of Patriotic Forces, Prokhanov was among those who signed the petition demanding the President's resignation.
  In July 1991, he signed the open letter, "A Word to the People", sometimes considered a program for the August coup makers. During the failed August 1991 coup, Prokhanov supported the State Emergency Committee. In the summer of 1992, Prokhanov formed the so-called "Day Movement", as an attempt to turn the newspaper's readership into a political movement.
  On 4 October 1993, the Ministry of Justice of Russia ordered a stop to the editorial and publishing activity of the newspaper Day; its office was raided by OMON, archive files and property was confiscated, staff members were physically assaulted. On the same day, after the Supreme Soviet's defenders' defeat, Prokhanov went into hiding in the woods on the outskirts of Ryazan. A week later he managed to publish several issues of Den in Minsk. In November 1993, Prokhanov's son-in-law Alexander Khudorozhkov registered the newspaper Zavtra (Tomorrow). Prokhanov became its editor-in-chief.
  In the 1996 Russian presidential election, Prokhanov supported the leader of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, Gennady Zyuganov. In 1997, he co-founded the Agency of Patriotic Information. Twice (in 1997 and 1999), he was physically assaulted, the first of these accidents ending with him hospitalized, suffering severe concussion.
  In 1999, together with Konstantin Kasimovsky, Prokhanov invited former klansman David Duke to visit the Russian Federation.
  In 2003, Prokhanov, Berezovsky, and Viktor Alksnis issued a joint statement concerning the Nord Ost terrorist attack, blaming the Russian authorities for the heavy loss of life and accusing Vladimir Putin of inefficiency. Also in 2003, Berezovsky and Prokhanov issued another joint memorandum, this time blaming the authorities for the murder of Sergei Yushenkov, and warning the people against the "great dangers coming from the Kremlin."
  His newspaper, Zavtra, had supported the Communist Party of the Russian Federation since the mid-1990s, but in 2005 it switched his support to the Rodina ("Motherland") party. Commenting on the Russian war with Georgia, Prokhanov said that Russia "has not been defeated by the West in the Cold War, because the Cold War continues. We lost gigantic territories, but we held Moscow. From here we launched our counterattack."
  Prokhanov founded Izborsk Club, a Eurasian think tank, in 2012.
  During the 2014 conflict in Ukraine, Prokhanov praised the Prime Minister of the self-proclaimed pro-Russian Donetsk People's Republic Alexander Borodai as a "true White Russian nationalist".
  In November 2014, a Russian court ordered Prokhanov to pay 500 thousand rubles to Andrey Makarevich whom he falsely accused (in the Izvestia-published article) of entertaining paratroopers in Sloviansk ("where he was heard by people in basements with broken hands and put out eyes") while the singer in fact performed in Sviatohirsk, singing for refugees.
caption: Prokhanov with Aleksey Mozgovoy, the Lugansk militia leader. 7 August 2014
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