The past month has seen a
string of protests in the Russian capital over city council elections. The
authorities' crackdown has only consolidated the movement.
12 August 2019
Rain and protests. Protests
and rain. Since mid-July, Moscow has been flooded by rain and engulfed in
public protests, sparked by the authorities’
cynical exclusion of viable opposition candidates from the upcoming
city council election. What should have been sunny weekends and picnics in the
parks, this summer is all about work, leaking shoes, and squabbles over
child-care. My husband, who is in a similar line of work, also reports on every
major protest, and our nanny has weekends off. So, we’re at each other’s
throats as to who’ll be watching the kid, and when.
On August
3, when police arrested over 1,000 people and beat dozens in the city
center, I worked for the first two hours, observing the unsanctioned protest,
and then picked up our six-year old from my husband, next to the boulevard
ring, flanked by police snatching random protesters and bystanders from the
crowd. With “Daddy” off to do his job, my son and I walked toward the metro
holding hands. Dozens of riot police in full protective gear, armed with thick
black batons, stood next to a blue bus with covered windows parked on the
sidewalk.
Mesmerized, my son stopped. In
their oversized helmets and visors, they looked remarkably like the
space-travellers from one of his computer games. “Mommy, what are they?” –
“These are police officers,” I reluctantly replied. “They are? And what are
they doing?” – “Detaining people.” – “Bad people?” – “No, just people.” – “But
why?” Unable to come up with a child-friendly explanation, I pulled on his
hand, “Come on, let’s go home and grab some ice-cream on the way.”
A few days later, the
prosecutors petitioned a
court in Moscow to strip a young couple of their parental rights because they
took their 1-year-old baby to a protest, allegedly exposing the child to harm
and neglecting their parental duties. Police searched their
house late at night. Both parents received interrogation summonses and, as they
had no child-care arrangements lined up, they ended up bringing
the baby to the interrogation. The investigator was unfazed. Apparently,
while bringing a small child to a peaceful protest is against the child’s best
interests, being present while his parents undergo a criminal interrogation is
perfectly fine.
At the same time, the
prosecutor’s office also opened a probe into any incident involving minors in
the protests, which, under a new law,
will most likely lead to administrative charges against protest leaders and
neglect warnings against parents. Thinking back to my son lingering next to
riot police officials, I found a sitter well in advance of the protest
scheduled for Saturday, August 10.
On August 9, the country’s
chief investigative agency issued a public warning in
connection with the protest planned for the next day, reminding those intending
to participate of possible sanctions, including criminal liability. The litany
of criminal cases opened against protesters over the past few weeks is ominous.
The authorities have already
arrested 12 people in
connection with the investigation they opened into “mass
rioting,” a crime punishable by up to 15 years in jail, over the
protest of July 27 – that very peaceful protest, at which police in
Moscow had set a chilling record detaining сlose to 1400.
Law enforcement has interrogated
and searched the homes of some of the opposition candidates who
planned to run in the city council elections and their particularly active
supporters, implicating them in a criminal investigation into
alleged “meddling in . . . citizens’ election rights and the work of election
commissions.” Authorities also targeted the Anti-Corruption Fund with money
laundering accusations. The group is led by Alexei Navalny, Russia’s leading
opposition politician, and has repeatedly called on people to protest the
recent exclusion of opposition candidates.
Also on August 9, the city
administration announced a “hurricane emergency” would be in place Friday
through Saturday. Despite the forecast hurricane, which never materialized, and
the rain, which was relentless, the city organized a free barbecue
festival at Moscow’s Gorky Park for the same day as the protest, in an
apparent attempt to divert Muscovites from the protest.
They called the festival
“Meat&Beat.” Given that dozens have suffered bruises, abrasions, fractures
and head traumas at the hands of police officers at protests in recent weeks,
the peculiar name comes across as possibly snide, but definitely, intentionally
ill-suited. In another mind-boggling stroke of coincidence or absurdity, the
penitentiary department scheduled its third annual paddy
wagons race for August 10 to mark Corrections
Transportation System Day, the next day.
It rained hard all night and
on the morning of August 10. Organizers feared that the foul weather and
crackdown would mean a low turnout at Sakharov Avenue for the rally the
authorities had grudgingly sanctioned. But in defiance of hostile weather and
the even more hostile political climate, between 50,000 and
60,000 mostly young adults gathered to demand free elections and an
end to political prosecution.
Hiding my camera under a
slicker, I looked at the bright faces around me and saw no fear. When the rally
was over, the sun suddenly made a long-awaited appearance, and unsanctioned
protest “walks” through the city center commenced. Groups of young people
marched in the streets, gleefully passing hordes of riot police and Russian
Guard servicemen chanting, “We’re the power! Russia will be free.”
Two steps away from the
presidential administration at Kitai Gorod, police detained dozens of
protesters, but more groups of young people stood their ground and continued
chanting, all while their mates were dragged into police vans. By nightfall,
lush grass and colorful flower beds at the Kitai Gorod Square were all but
destroyed by police boots. And 256
people had been detained, facing hefty fines and short-term arrest,
but the protest’s spirit remained unbroken.
What happens next remains to
be seen, but one thing is clear: the authorities’ strong-arm response of these
recent weeks has ended up bringing together rather than intimidating those
Russians who are fed up by exclusion and repression.
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