Russia cracks down on anti-Putin protests

07 Dec 11 | Russia

Thousands of people have taken part in opposition rallies against Vladimir Putin’s United Russia after allegations of widespread electoral fraud.

Police and anti-Putin protesters have clashed every day since the parliamentary elections on 4 December.

Hundreds of people protested against election fraud directly on elections day; most were detained by police. There were 8-10 thousand people (two thousand according to the police) in the centre of Moscow the day after elections.

Opposition leaders Ilya Yashin and Alexey Navalny were detained, as well as journalists from Reuters, Bloomberg, The New Times magazine, “Izvestia” newspaper and Lenta.ru news agency. The journalists were released, but Yashin and Navalny were sentenced to 15 days of arrest for “failure to follow a lawful order of policeman”. Both claim they didn’t break the law.

On 6 December, there was a rally at Triumphalnaya Square in Moscow with more than 1,000 protesters. People chanted “Putin thief”, “Russia without Putin”, “It’s a shame to be in NASHI”.

NASHI, a pro-government youth movementallied with two other pro-Kremlin organisations – “Stal” and “United Russia’s Young Guard” – celebrated the victory of United Russia in the parliamentary elections. Seventeen thousand members of these movements gathered at Moscow centre on 6 December. About two thousand of them went to Moscow’s Triumphalnaya Square to prevent anti-Putin protesters from holding a rally by standing there and shouting out “Putin, Medvedev, victory”.

Between 250 and 300 protesters were detained, including Yabloko party leader Sergey Mitrokhin; People’s Freedom Party leader Boris Nemtsov; Other Russia activist Eduard Limonov; Oleg Orlov , head of the Memorial human rights organisation; and journalists Bozhena Rynska of Gazeta.ru and Alexandr Chernykh of Kommersant.

Over 50,000 Ministry of Interior troops are located in Moscow together with policemen. Protesters and journalists have complained of their brutality and aggression from soldiers.

Similar protests were held in Saint-Petersburg  by about 800 protesters, 200 of whom were detained whilst Rostov-na-Donu, saw 300 protesters on the streets, 15 of whom were detained.

Russian TV reported on the actions of pro-government movements’ as if they were the only ones held. Pro-Putin demonstrators were described as “citizens tired of marginal groups they don’t support”, in coverage reminiscent of Breznev-era propaganda.

Activists were disappointed by a controversial statement made by Pavel Gusev, the leader of Journalists’ Union in Moscow,  and public council of Moscow police, Olga Kostina. They accused journalists covering the anti-Putin demonstrations of “being biased and lacking objectivity” and “bringing difficulties to law enforcement authorities”.

In the meantime US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton expressed “serious concerns about the conduct of the election”. Catherine Ashton, the EU’s High representative for foreign affairs and security policy expressed the same concerns commenting on a “lack of media impartiality, lack of separation between party and state, and the harassment of independent monitoring attempts” during parliamentary elections.

A big opposition rally against election fraud is expected on 10 December at Moscow Revolution Square just near the Kremlin. Moscow officials have authorised the rally, but troops remain in the city.

 

Hacked websites and fraud mark Russia’s parliamentary elections

05 Dec 11 | Digital Freedom, Russia

Parliamentary elections were held in Russia yesterday (4 December). Several independent media websites were hacked on election day; journalists and rights activists claim this was to prevent coverage of electoral violations.

With 96 per cent of votes processed by 5 December, United Russia has polled 49.54 per cent. That’s a 15 per cent decrease since the 2007 elections. Consequently, United Russia, led by Vladimir Putin, has lost its constitutional majority. It now has just 238 out of 450 seats in the Russian State Duma.

The other seats were taken by the Communist Party (which polled 19.16 per cent), A Just Russia (13.22) and LDPR (11.66). Three parties, including the opposition Yabloko led by noted Russian economist Grigory Yavlinsky, didn’t get over the threshold of seven per cent necessary to enter the Duma.

Every major party bar United Russia complained of violations. Observers and journalists reported vote fraud and “carousels” when a group of the same people voted several times at different poll stations in an organised way.

Monitors said they were removed from polling stations after trying to complain, or that their complaints were not logged. At one polling station in Moscow the head of a district election comission ostentatiously poured hot tea on complaints filed by an observer.

Russia’s leading independent watchdog — GOLOS Association — reported over 5,000 violations. Yabloko and Communist Party observers said that in Moscow alone they logged no fewer than 50 incidents. The Interior Ministry said there were 2,000 election law violations registered, none of which were likely to affect the elections results.

Protests were held in Moscow and St Petersburg against “unfair elections” by several opposition movements. Most of the participants (about 100 people in each city) were detained.

It was difficult for journalists to report violations.  Many independent media websites were hacked early on 4 December and were inaccessible for the whole day. One couldn’t read about fraud on websites of Echo Moskvy radio station, Kommersant newspaper, The New Times, Forbes Russia and Bolshoy Gorod magazines, or the Slon.ru news portal. Blogging service LiveJournal, a popular discussion platform, was also down, having experienced biggest hacking attack in its history. Finally, GOLOS’ website and its remarkable Map of Election Violations — an online map with messages about elections fraud from all over Russia — were hacked.

With the cyber-attacks preventing observers reporting fraud online, journalists and rights activists instead used Facebook and Twitter to spread and exchange information.

But in spite of their efforts, the head of the Central Election Commission Vladimir Churov expressed confidence in the results, claiming that thousands of violations reports were “lies” and the elections were held in line with the law. The OSCE filed a report saying that the Duma elections were “technically well-administered”, but “marked by the convergence of the State and the governing party”.

Critics rallied on 5 December, with over 5,000 people in Moscow protesting against “illegitimate elections”. Russian TV has yet to report this.