After far-right extremists rioted in Moscow, lashing out over the killing of an ethnic Russian allegedly at the hands of an unnamed Muslim migrant from the North Caucuses, Moscow Police responded:  By going out the next day and rounding up hundreds of migrant workers.

It’s not clear what charges are being used against the 1,200 – 1,600 migrants who work in a vegetable warehouse targeted by the racist mob a day earlier, now in the hands of Russian cops.  Police told Russian radio the workers were being investigated for unspecific “criminal activity”.

Increased immigration was a huge issue in the recent Moscow Mayoral election, won by the Kremlin’s chosen candidate.  Russian nationalists are having a hard time getting along with the influx of migrants from Russia's heavily Muslim North Caucasus and former Soviet states of the Caucasus and Central Asia.  This is even though, like migrants everywhere in the world, they end up taking the low-paying manual labor jobs the better-off locals don’t want.

On Sunday, hundreds of the nationalists chanted racist slogans as they attacked the produce warehouse, overturning cars and trucks, and smashing quite a few watermelons to make their point.  Hundreds were arrested but most were released without charges.