12 Mar 12 | Russia
Thousands of people gathered on central Moscow street Novy Arbat on Sunday to call for Vladimir Putin to step down. The rally was a follow-up to mass protest rallies which started after allegedly fraudulent parliamentary elections in December.
It was much smaller than the protests leading up to the election, and the mood was dramatically altered.
This time, people had to face the reality that the right to freedom could not be achieved in just three months and that the opposition’s most popular slogan “Russia without Putin” cannot be actualised without a clear political strategy. Some opposition leaders, who have been courageously protesting against Putin must now re-evaluate their strategies. At the protest, TV host Ksenia Sobchak stood on stage and said that protesters needed to “form a concrete list of what they are standing up for”. “This road is long, but Russia will be free in the end”, said Grigory Yavlinsky, Yabloko party founder and unregistered presidential candidate, reflecting the principal current message of Russian opposition: it takes time for the civil society to restore their violated rights.
One of Russia’s leading independent political scientists, Dmitry Oreshkin, monitored the elections on 4 March. Together with other independent elections monitors, he announced the presidential election results based on their independent calculations. Oreshkin claims Putin did not win the elections in Moscow and Saint-Petersburg (in these cities he got less than 50 per cent needed to win in the first round, independent monitors counted). This marks a tendency, which is likely to spread over Russia, Oreshkin said to protesters: if big cities citizens don’t vote for Putin today, smaller cities won’t vote for him either tomorrow.
Left Front leader Sergey Udaltsov tried to march to Pushkin Square with his supporters after the rally. Hundreds of Moscow nationalists tried to do the same on Stary Arbat avenue. Protesters from both groups were arrested “for breaking the law on rallies”. Opposition in Saint-Petersburg also tried to march in the city centre, but police hadn’t sanctioned the action, and 40 protesters were arrested.
Monitors’ reports and plans to form a detailed political strategy were the two major topics of the rally on the 10 March. The third was dedicated to political prisoners in Russia, particularly two members of the punk feminist group “Pussy Riot”, Nadezhda Tolokonnikkova and Maria Alekhina, who were arrested after their act of protest in a cathedral, and Alexey Kozlov, the husband of human rights activist and one of the rally’s organisers Olga Romanova.
Many of the participants in the rally planned to attend the court hearings on Kozlov and Pussy Riot. Those who protest against Vladimir Putin and demand political reform are amongst those who also call for profound reform of the judicial system.
07 Mar 12 | News and features
Tena Prelec reports from the hooliganism trial of Russian feminist punk group Pussy Riot
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07 Mar 12 | Russia
Members of the Russian feminist punk band Pussy Riot have been arrested in Moscow on the eve of the country’s presidential elections on charges of hooliganism. The Moscow court in charge decided to keep them imprisoned until 24 April, when they will be tried facing a sentence of up to 7 years. Two band members, both mothers, have announced a hunger strike until they are reunited with their children.
Pussy Riot is one of the most unusual of all the opposition groups that have arisen in Moscow over the past few months. They perform political songs dressed in colourful mini-skirts and balaclavas. Their faces are covered so anyone can potentially join in. They were arrested after performing an anti-Putin punk prayer in Moscow’s Christ the Saviour cathedral.
The trial was supposed to take place on 5 March, the same day when mass demonstrations were scheduled to happen in Moscow. Journalists gathered at the Taganka court at 3pm, but were kept waiting for many hours in vain. “The strategy seems to be to wait for all of us to go to the protests, and hold the trial without a consistent presence of the press,” one said.
Waiting for the trial to start, the band members’ lawyer Nikolai Polozov told Index: “I do not understand why the trial is being postponed for such a long time. I got notice it was delayed by one, then two and then three hours, but now the inquirer does not even pick up my phone calls. If supporting documents are not brought in within 48 hours of the arrests, which is within a couple of hours, they will be forced to release them. But they could always determine the moment of the arrest to a later hour or find another legal caveat to keep them in”.
The supporting documents were eventually brought in. Two more band members were arrested in the evening hours of the same day.
Many Russians are showing support for the group through social media and real life actions. On 8 March, International Women’s Day, a number of flash mobs in support of the group are planned to take place all over Moscow. Recently re-elected president Vladimir Putin has stated he disapproves of the womens’ actions in the cathedral.
23 Feb 12 | Europe and Central Asia, News and features
Pussy Riot is a feminist punk collective from Moscow. They hide their faces under coloured balaclavas, use nicknames to remain anonymous and perform unsanctioned concerts in peculiar places. Since their emergence last autumn Pussy Riot have performed in underground station, in shops and on trolleybuses and detention centres’ roofs.
Pussy Riot came to the attention of Russia’s anti-extremist police in late January, when they performed an anti-Putin song in the Red Square right in front of Kremlin. The performers were arrested and had to spend several hours in a police cell.
But this week’s “concert” brought them real public attention after they performed what they called a punk prayer “Mother of God, send Putin away” in Moscow’s biggest Orthodox Cathedral. It is the Cathedral high-ranking officials usually attend on the biggest Orthodox holidays. The leader of the Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, is a Putin supporter.
The band got into the cathedral just like regular parishioners, but then started dancing and shouting out anti-Putin words:
KGB head is the biggest saint, who leads protesters to pre-trial prisons … The Patriarch believes in Putin. He should rather believe in God … Mother of God, become a feminist… Send Putin away
The group managed to evade the cathedral’s security, and no one was arrested. Even if one of them did get arrested, she would be quickly replaced, the women explained to journalists. Pussy Riot has no leaders or permanent participants — they are just an anonymous group of punk feminists fighting authoritarianism.
