European Forum

Massive protests in Russia

On December 10th the biggest popular protest took place in Russia since the 1990s. According to the police 20.000-25.000 took part in the sanctioned protest against election falsifications in central Moscow, but according to the organisers it was closer to 85.000. Bolotnaya square, the protest’s location, did not have enough space for all the participants, and the police removed fences so that the protest could spill over into adjoining streets. A couple of thousand people joined later from a different gathering location, the Revolution square.

Peaceful protest
The protest passed peacefully, without interference from the police, and the organisers thanked them for it, saying the police acted ‘as if in a democratic state.’ The protest kicked-off with an address by the author of the hit-song ‘Our nuthouse votes for Putin’ that has become an internet sensation over the past month or so. While protesters shouted ‘Russia without Putin’, human rights defender Lev Ponomarev informed them that at that point over 40.000 people had gathered and asked them to provide the footage of the protest on the internet later that day.

The protest also included addresses by famous oppositionists, including Boris Nemtsov (Party of Popular Freedom (PARNAS) co-leader), Anastasia Udaltsova (wife of the Left Front leader currently in jail), Yabloko leader Grigori Yavlinski and Mikhail Kasyanov (PARNAS co-leader), who said the presidential elections would be different: ‘on 4 March […] we will not allow Putin into the Kremlin.’

The opposition called for the annulment of the election results and the release of blogger Alexey Navalny and youth leader Ilya Yashin (currently in jail for 15 days).

Political scientist Dmitri Oreshkin announced what were, according to him, the true results of the elections, saying United Russia gained no more than 30% nation-wide, and 26% in Moscow.

Just Russia mandates
At the protest, MP from the Just Russia party Gennadi Gudkov stated that the elections were unfair, and ‘we will hand in our parliamentary mandates.’ Some days earlier, the Yabloko party had called on those opposition parties that passed the parliamentary threshold to hand in their mandates in protest.

However, Just Russia leader Sergey Mironov stated later that day that the party will not hand in its mandates, and Gudkov was expressing his personal opinion. ‘The people believed in us, and we are not planning on surrendering the Duma to United Russia.’ He also added that Just Russia at the same time does not accept the results of the regional parliamentary elections in St Petersburg and Astrakhan and will strive for a recount. Nationally, Just Russia gained 13% of the votes, and 64 seats in the Duma.

National and international protest
Although the biggest protest was in Moscow, other cities joined in as well. In St Petersburg the protesters were estimated to be around 7.000, about 3.000 people gathered in Novosibirsk, over a thousand people gathered in Tomsk, Omsk, Yekaterinburg and Chelyabinsk, and about 500 people gathered in an unsanctioned protest in Ufa. The number of cities that saw protests varies from 80 to 130 according to different estimations. In some cities the protests continued the next day.

Protests against unfair elections in Russia also took place in a number of European countries, USA, Canada, Japan, Australia and others.

Coverage
Surprisingly, the opposition protest was covered by the national channels including NTV and Russia-24 (which is not normally the case). There were rumours that a news presenter of the NTV channel, Alexey Pivovarov, refused to go on air if there wouldn’t be reports of the protest. NTV denied the rumours, but broadcasted from the square in its news coverage, led by Pivovarov.

Authorities’ response The United Russia leadership commented on the protests, saying the demands of the protesters will not go unnoticed, but that the protest was not extraordinarily big for a population of many millions. They did not elaborate on what they mean with the demands not going unnoticed.

The Central Election Commission (CEC) said that the demands to abolish the election results stated at the protest are baseless. CEC Deputy Chair Stanislav Vavilov said ‘yesterday the protocols were signed. The elections were found valid, […] There are no reasons to reconsider the election results.’ He added that the local election commission should still consider any complaints.

PM Vladimir Putin’s press-secretary Dmitri Peskov said that the government can not yet formulate its attitude towards the protest.

Counterprotest
Pro-Kremlin youth groups are expected to hold a counter demonstration today (12 December). United Russia youth wing leader Timur Prokopenko was quoted as saying they were prepared to gather about 170.000 people in support of the official election results.

Significance
The protests are the first instance of such massive popular expression of dissatisfaction in modern Russian history, and can only be compared to the situation in the early 90s. They mark a shift in public attention and participation in the country’s political life. Criticism of the authorities, that has grown harsher, more outspoken, more widespread and more mainstream over the past months, thus found its climax.

Although at this point it seems unlikely that this will result in a Russian colour revolution (or ‘Snow revolution’ as it has been dubbed on the internet) in the very near future, the protest marks the beginning of a new, more difficult era for Vladimir Putin. While the protests now seem to pass without major incidents, the development of the situation in the coming months will be crucial in the run-up to the March presidential elections.

Party of Popular Freedom (PARNAS) co-leader Vladimir Ryzhkov announced that another similar protest would be planned for 24 December, and invited all those present to participate again. The opposition has applied to the Moscow city administration for permission to hold a protest on that day, with 50.000 or more participants.\

Sources:
Newsru.com
Interfax
Radio Free Europe-Radio Liberty