On 12 June, 2009 two activists with the Other Russia coalition were assaulted and beaten up by the police in the town of Rostov-on-Don located in the South of Russia. It was pre-emptive measure to disrupt the planned rally “Russia against Putin”. It didn’t matter that the organizers had received the authorization from the city administration. It didn’t deter police force from open assault.
Archive for the ‘Article’ Category
Too political “E”
Thursday, June 18th, 2009A Year On, Few Clues in an Opposition Death
Wednesday, December 10th, 2008
SERPUKHOV, Moscow Region — Yury Chervochkin had no Internet connection at his apartment in this industrial town 100 kilometers south of Moscow where he lived with his mother and younger brother.
So when the 22-year-old opposition activist was released from police custody on the evening of Nov. 22, 2007, he went straight to the Internet cafe Portal in the center of town to post an account of his detention on an opposition blog community.
National Bolshevik Convicted
Tuesday, October 28th, 2008A Moscow court on Monday convicted an opposition activist of being a member of the banned National Bolshevik Party, a ruling the radical youth group said could spark a wave of similar convictions.
The Arbat District Magistrates Court convicted Murmansk resident Andrei Nikitin, 20, of participating in a group banned for extremist activities and handed him a one-year suspended sentence with two years probation, Moscow City Court spokeswoman Anna Usachyova said.
Revolutionary Rock
Friday, October 24th, 2008Opposition groups release a new collection of protest songs.
Russian rock music, which was in didactic opposition to the Soviet Union before its fall in the early 90s, has lately tended to compromise with the increasingly authoritarian Kremlin rather than challenge it.
Some leading Russian rock figures, for instance, entertained the Kremlin-backed youth movement Nashi at its summer camp on Lake Seliger in 2005 and 2006 as well as performed on Red Square to celebrate the election of Dmitry Medvedev to the presidency on March 2 this year. (more…)
Police Raid National Bolshevik’s Apartment
Friday, August 8th, 2008Police raided the apartment of an activist with the banned National Bolshevik Party on Thursday and confiscated a computer and several books by opposition leader Eduard Limonov, a spokesman for the opposition coalition The Other Russia said.
Police entered the apartment of activist Maxim Gasovich in southern Moscow at around 9 a.m. in search of fellow opposition activist Darya Isayeva, who is being investigated on suspicion of extremism for a stunt in a Yolki-Palki restaurant last month, spokesman Alexander Averin said. (more…)
Irreverent English-Language Tabloid Closes Down
Monday, June 23rd, 2008
After 11 years of providing Moscow readers with investigative journalism, irreverent commentary, and sophomoric gags, the English-language newspaper the “The eXile” is closing down after investors fled in the face of a government inspection of the paper’s content.
The alternative tabloid — known for its Gonzo-style journalism on drugs, sex, politics, and the seamier side of Moscow nightlife — announced the closure in a blog posted on its website on June 11.
The paper’s demise, and the investors’ flight, was sparked by a visit on June 6 by inspectors from the Federal Service for Mass Media, Telecommunications, and the Protection of Cultural Heritage.
Mr. Limonov on Mr. Medvedev
Thursday, May 8th, 2008We have now two presidents in Russia: old one is Mister Putin and a new one, appointed on March 2, Mister Medvedev. That idiocy will be formally ended on May 7, when Mr. Medvedev will be inaugurated in Kremlin’s seat. But nevertheless, for more than two months, Russia was headed by two presidents.
As to Putin’s in his first years of presidency to Mr. Medvedev also could be addressed banal questions: “Who is Mister Medvedev?” Because Mr. Medvedev is not a political figure, he is a practically unknown bureaucrat, one of a huge crowd of bureaucrats surrounding Putin. As Putin himself is a small bureaucrat, one from a huge crowd of “chinovniks” surrounding Yeltsin. If the elected president had been named Zyuganov or Yavlinski or Kasparov or even Limonov, nobody in Russia would have asked a question: “Who is that man?” Because these are political leaders, actors in Russian political play. They are known to general population. Mr. Medvedev, on the contrary, is not known, or wasn’t known, at all. Mr. Medvedev is not a leader of political party, he is not a member of political party, so he is not a political man. We can guess that he is a member of Putin’s circle of close friends, a member of some inner circle. If he is to be appointed to the post of guarding of their interests, we are guessing that Mr. Medvedev is trusted by Mr. Putin’s group and Mr. Putin himself.
Putin’s Pariah
Sunday, March 2nd, 2008
Correction Appended
It began inauspiciously. On a frozen afternoon in late November, as Moscow was draped with blocklong plastic billboards, banners and flags, each proclaiming a variation on a single theme — “POBEDA PUTINA — POBEDA ROSSII!” (“A Victory for Putin Is a Victory for Russia”) — a few thousand Russians converged on the city center for a rare act of political theater. It seemed, at first, like a tableau from the last days of the U.S.S.R., those heady months when glasnost swelled the streets with protesters. A handful of dissidents stood on a flatbed truck; a jumble of loudspeakers were stacked below; the crew of foreign reporters vastly outnumbered the local press; and across the way, the secret policemen with their unseen amplifiers were drowning the protest in canned laughter and Soviet waltzes. (more…)
Through Black Glasses (Limonov on Russia)
Monday, February 11th, 2008
Russian nation was created by Russian climate and Russian blood.
Contrary to common misconception, Russians living on territory of Russian Federation are not of Slavic blood. The ancient inhabitants of Kiev’s principate were Slavic people, that’s true. When Moscow principality was created a few centuries later in the 14th century, its population was overwhelmingly Urgo-Finns. Descendants of Kiev’s genealogical tree, their princes were originally of Slavic blood. But when Kiev’s armies moved north with their small troops, they conquered enormous vast variety of Finnish tribes who lived on enormous territory of European Russia. Only aristocrats of Russia were originally Slavs. Simple folk were descendants of Finns. That is why it is practically no different between “Chuvash” and “Finn.” And that is why Serbs are so different from Russians. Because Serbs are Slavs.
My Country Killed Yuri Chervochkin
Friday, December 14th, 2007
Yuri Chervochkin died on December 10. He was less then 23 years old. A member of now banned National-Bolshevik Party, he joined in January 2006, when party was not banned yet. Militant activist, Yuri participated in some party actions. Most notoriously, on March 11, 2007, he and some other members of the “The Other Russia” coalition disrupted elections at a regional parliament in Odintsovo, a town in the Moscow region. Shouting the slogan: “Your elections are a farce!” the group of youths occupied the premises of electoral commission. Yuri was captured, held in prison for about a month, was released on parole and was awaiting a trial. He didn’t have a chance to live his trial through. After his release in May 2007, Yuri became a target for the special militia forces for struggle against terrorism and political extremism of RUBOP (Regional Command of Struggle Against Organized Crimes), which is controlled by the Ministry of the Interior. Those brutes, trained to kill, having no scruples, killers by choice and profession, were employed to suppress political opposition somewhere in the middle of 2004. Their new employment, never officially disclosed, was equal to the creation of the death esquadrons in Latin America in the 1960s.