Russia protest Putin.

MOSCOW (AP) — Chanting slogans against President Vladimir Putin, tens of thousands took to the streets Sunday across Russia to demand the release of jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny, keeping up nationwide protests that have rattled the Kremlin. More than 5,100 people were detained by police, according to a monitoring group, and some were beaten.

The massive protests came despite efforts by Russian authorities to stem the tide of demonstrations after tens of thousands rallied across the country last weekend in the largest, most widespread show of discontent that Russia had seen in years. Despite threats of jail terms, warnings to social media groups and tight police cordons, the protests again engulfed cities across Russia’s 11 time zones on Sunday.

Navalny’s team quickly called another protest in Moscow for Tuesday, when he is set to face a court hearing that could send him to prison for years.

The 44-year-old Navalny, an anti-corruption investigator who is Putin’s best-known critic, was arrested on Jan. 17 upon returning from Germany, where he spent five months recovering from nerve-agent poisoning that he blames on the Kremlin. Russian authorities have rejected the accusations. He was arrested for allegedly violating his parole conditions by not reporting for meetings with law enforcement when he was recuperating in Germany.

The United States urged Russia to release Navalny and criticized the crackdown on protests.

“The U.S. condemns the persistent use of harsh tactics against peaceful protesters and journalists by Russian authorities for a second week straight,” U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Twitter.

The Russian Foreign Ministry rejected Blinken’s call as “crude interference in Russia’s internal affairs” and accused Washington of trying to destabilize the situation in the country by backing the protests.

On Sunday, police detained more than 5,100 people in cities nationwide, according to OVD-Info, a group that monitors political arrests, surpassing some 4,000 detentions at the demonstrations across Russia on Jan. 23.

In Moscow, authorities introduced unprecedented security measures in the city center, closing subway stations near the Kremlin, cutting bus traffic and ordering restaurants and stores to stay closed.

Navalny’s team initially called for Sunday’s protest to be held on Moscow’s Lubyanka Square, home to the main headquarters of the Federal Security Service, which Navalny contends was responsible for his poisoning. Facing police cordons around the square, the protest shifted to other central squares and streets.

Police were randomly picking up people and putting them into police buses, but thousands of protesters marched across the city center for hours, chanting “Putin, resign!” and “Putin, thief!” — a reference to an opulent Black Sea estate reportedly built for the Russian leader that was featured in a widely popular video released by Navalny’s team.

“I’m not afraid, because we are the majority,” said protester Leonid Martynov. “We mustn’t be scared by clubs because the truth is on our side.”

At one point, crowds of demonstrators walked toward the Matrosskaya Tishina prison where Navalny is being held. They were met by phalanxes of riot police who pushed the march back and chased protesters through courtyards.

Demonstrators continued to march around the Russian capital, zigzagging around police cordons. Officers broke them into smaller groups and detained scores, beating some with clubs and occasionally using tasers.

Over 1,600 people were detained in Moscow, including Navalny’s wife, Yulia, who was released after several hours pending a court hearing Monday on charges of taking part in an unsanctioned protest. “If we keep silent, they will come after any of us tomorrow,” she said on Instagram before turning out to protest.

Amnesty International said that authorities in Moscow have arrested so many people that the city’s detention facilities have run out of space. “The Kremlin is waging a war on the human rights of people in Russia, stifling protesters’ calls for freedom and change,” Natalia Zviagina, the group’s Moscow office head, said in a statement.

Several thousand people marched across Russia’s second-largest city of St. Petersburg, chanting “Down with the czar!” and occasional scuffles erupted as some demonstrators pushed back police who tried to make detentions. Over 1,100 were arrested.

Some of the biggest rallies were held in Novosibirsk and Krasnoyarsk in eastern Siberia and Yekaterinburg in the Urals.

“I do not want my grandchildren to live in such a country,” said 55-year-old Vyacheslav Vorobyov, who turned out for a rally in Yekaterinburg. “I want them to live in a free country.”

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Swedish Foreign Minister Ann Linde, who currently chairs the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, condemned “the excessive use of force by authorities and mass detention of peaceful protesters and journalists” and urged Russia “to release all those unjustly detained, including Navalny.”

As part of a multipronged effort by authorities to block the protests, courts have jailed Navalny’s associates and activists across the country over the past week. His brother Oleg, top aide Lyubov Sobol and three other people were put under a two-month house arrest Friday on charges of allegedly violating coronavirus restrictions during last weekend’s protests.

Prosecutors also demanded that social media platforms block calls to join the protests.

The Interior Ministry issued stern warnings to the public, saying protesters could be charged with taking part in mass riots, which carries a prison sentence of up to eight years.

Protests were fueled by a two-hour YouTube video released by Navalny’s team after his arrest about the Black Sea residence purportedly built for Putin. The video has been viewed over 100 million times, inspiring a stream of sarcastic jokes on the internet amid an economic downturn.

Russia has seen extensive corruption during Putin’s time in office while poverty has remained widespread.

“All of us feel pinched financially, so people who take to the streets today feel angry,” said Vladimir Perminov who protested in Moscow. “The government’s rotation is necessary.”

Demonstrators in Moscow chanted “Aqua discotheque!” — a reference to one of the fancy amenities at the residence that also features a casino and a hookah lounge equipped for watching pole dances.

Putin says neither he nor any of his close relatives own the property. On Saturday, construction magnate Arkady Rotenberg, a longtime Putin confidant and his occasional judo sparring partner, claimed that he himself owned the property.

Navalny fell into a coma on Aug. 20 while on a flight from Siberia to Moscow and the pilot diverted the plane so he could be treated in the city of Omsk. He was transferred to a Berlin hospital two days later. Labs in Germany, France and Sweden, and tests by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, established that he was exposed to the Novichok nerve agent.

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Russian authorities have refused to open a full-fledged criminal inquiry, claiming lack of evidence that he was poisoned.

Navalny was arrested immediately upon his return to Russia earlier this month and jailed for 30 days on the request of Russia’s prison service, which alleged he had violated the probation of his suspended sentence from a 2014 money-laundering conviction that he has rejected as political revenge.

On Thursday, a Moscow court rejected Navalny’s appeal to be released, and the hearing Tuesday could turn his 3 1/2-year suspended sentence into one he must serve in prison.

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MOSCOW (AP) — Russian authorities said Wednesday they are slowing down the speed of uploading photos and videos to Twitter over its failure to remove banned content — part of growing efforts to clamp down on social media platforms that have played a major role in amplifying dissent.

The state communications watchdog, Roskomnadzor, said it began the slowdown after it said the platform failed to remove the content encouraging suicide among children and containing information about drugs and child pornography.

The agency warned that if Twitter refuses to abide by Russian law it could be blocked entirely, but voiced hope that the platform would “take a constructive stance” and comply with the demand to remove the banned content. Vadim Subbotin, deputy chief of Roskomnadzor, said in televised remarks that Twitter is the only social platform that has “openly ignored the Russian authorities’ demand to remove the banned content.”

Twitter’s user policies outline a host of banned behaviors, including prohibiting content that involves child sexual exploitation or material that promotes or encourages suicide or self harm. An email seeking comment on the Russian action was sent to Twitter.

The action against Twitter comes as the authorities have criticized social media platforms that have been used to bring tens of thousands of people into the streets across Russia this year to demand the release of jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny. The wave of demonstrations served as a major challenge to the Kremlin.

Russian authorities have assailed the platforms for failing to remove calls for children to join opposition protests — which is against the law in Russia.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Wednesday that the government has “no desire to block anything,” but added that it was necessary to enforce compliance with the law.

The move against Twitter is part of continuous efforts by the government to tighten control over social platforms.

In 2014, the authorities adopted a law requiring online services to store the personal data of Russian users on servers in Russia and have since tried to make Facebook and Twitter to comply with it. Both companies have been repeatedly fined, first small amounts of around $50 and last year the equivalent of $63,000 each, for not complying.

The government has stopped short of outright bans even though the law allows it, probably fearing that the move would elicit too much public outrage. Only the social network LinkedIn, which wasn’t very popular in Russia, has been banned by the authorities for the failure to store user data in Russia.

As the Russian authorities moved Wednesday to slow down Twitter, some Russian government websites suffered outages and access problems. It’s not clear if those are connected, and some experts suggested they could have been the result of unrelated cyberattacks.

Russia’s Ministry of Digital Development acknowledged that some government websites suffered outages, but charged that they were linked to equipment problems at communications provider Rostelecom.

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MOSCOW (AP) — Russian police on Saturday detained about 200 participants at a forum of independent members of municipal councils, an action that comes amid the authorities’ multi-pronged crackdown on dissent.

Police showed up at the gathering in Moscow shortly after it opened, saying that all those present would be detained for taking part in an event organized by an “undesirable” organization. A police officer leading the raid said the detainees would be taken to police precincts and charged with administrative violations.

Moscow police said in a statement that they moved to stop the meeting because it violated coronavirus restrictions with many participants failing to wear masks. Police said they detained about 200 participants, some of whom were members of an unspecified “undesirable” organization.

OVD-Info, an independent group monitoring arrests and political repression, posted a list of more than 170 people who were detained. They included Ilya Yashin, an opposition politician who leads one of Moscow’s municipal districts; former mayor of Yekaterinburg Yevgeny Roizman; and Moscow’s municipal council member Yulia Galyamina.

“Their goal was to scare people away from engaging in politics,” Andrei Pivovarov, a politician who helped organize the forum, said in a video from a police van.

Pivovarov has played a leading role in Open Russia, a group funded by self-exiled Russian tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky. Khodorkovsky moved to London after spending 10 years in prison in Russia on charges widely seen as political revenge for challenging President Vladimir Putin’s rule.

A 2015 law introduced criminal punishment for membership in “undesirable” organizations. The government has used the law to ban about 30 groups, including Open Russia.

An earlier law obliged non-governmental organizations that receive foreign funding and engage in activities loosely described as political to register as “foreign agents.”

The laws have been widely criticized as part of the Kremlin’s efforts to stifle dissent, but the Russian authorities have described them as a fit response to alleged Western efforts to undermine the country.

The police crackdown on Saturday’s forum follows the arrest and imprisonment of Russian opposition leader, Alexei Navalny.

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s most determined political foe was arrested on Jan. 17 upon returning from Germany, where he spent five months recovering from a nerve-agent poisoning that he blames on the Kremlin. Russian authorities have rejected the accusation.

Last month, Navalny was sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison for violating the terms of his probation while convalescing in Germany — charges he dismissed as a Kremlin vendetta. His arrest and imprisonment triggered a wave of protests across Russia, to which the authorities responded with a massive crackdown.

The government has intensified its crackdown on the opposition ahead of parliamentary elections set for September as the popularity of the main Kremlin-backed party, United Russia, has dwindled.

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MOSCOW (AP) — Russian authorities said Tuesday they would block Twitter in a month if it doesn’t take steps to remove banned content, a move that escalates the Russian government’s drawn-out standoff with social media platforms that have played a major role in amplifying dissent in Russia.

Russia’s state communications watchdog, Roskomnadzor, last week announced it was slowing down the speed of uploading photos and videos to Twitter over its alleged failure to remove content encouraging suicide among children and information about drugs and child pornography.

The agency said Twitter has failed to remove more than 3,000 posts with banned content, including more than 2,500 posts encouraging suicide among minors. The platform responded by emphasizing its policy of zero tolerance for child sexual exploitation, promotion of suicide and drug sales.

On Tuesday, deputy chief of Roskomnadzor Vadim Subbotin argued that Twitter still wasn’t complying with the demands of the Russian authorities.

“Twitter doesn’t react to our requests appropriately, and if things go on like this, then in a month it will be blocked, on an out-of-court basis,” Subbotin told the Interfax news agency. He added that Roskomnadzor at this point “is not registering specific steps by Twitter to remove prohibited content.”

Twitter did not respond immediately to an email request for comment.

Authorities have criticized social media platforms that have been used to bring tens of thousands of people into the streets across Russia this year to demand the release of jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny. The wave of demonstrations was the largest in years and posed a major challenge to the Kremlin.

The authorities alleged social media platforms failed to remove calls for children to join the protests. Russian President Vladimir Putin has urged police to act more to monitor social platforms and to track down those who “draw the children into illegal and unsanctioned street actions.”

The government’s efforts to tighten control of the internet and social media date back to 2012, when a law allowing authorities to blacklist and block certain online content was adopted. Since then, a growing number of restrictions targeting messaging apps, websites and social media platforms have been introduced.

In 2014, authorities adopted a law requiring online services to store the personal data of Russian users on servers in Russia and have since tried to make Facebook and Twitter comply with it. Both companies have been repeatedly fined, first small amounts of around $50 and last year the equivalent of $63,000 each, for not complying.

The government has repeatedly aired threats to block the two social media giants, but stopped short of outright bans even though the law allows it, probably fearing the move would elicit too much public outrage. Only the social network LinkedIn, which wasn’t very popular in Russia, has been banned by the authorities for the failure to store user data in Russia.

However, some experts have said that the authorities might be seriously considering the possibility of bans this time around.

Subbotin said Tuesday that Roskomnadzor has the necessary “technical capabilities” to block Twitter, and that the agency doesn’t rule out slowing down or blocking other online platforms if they “violate Russian laws and don’t comply with Roskomnadzor’s demands.”

In 2018, Roskomnadzor failed to restrict access to the popular messaging app Telegram over its refusal to hand over encryption keys used to scramble messages. Last year, the watchdog officially withdrew the demands to block Telegram, which has been widely used despite the ban, including by government institutions.

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MOSCOW (AP) — Imprisoned Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny said Wednesday he has started a hunger strike to protest authorities’ failure to provide proper treatment for his back and leg pains.

In a statement posted on Instagram, Navalny complained about prison officials’ refusal to give him the right medicines and to allow his doctor to visit him behind bars.

He also protested the hourly checks a guard makes on him at night, saying they amount to sleep deprivation torture.

The 44-year-old Navalny, who is President Vladimir Putin’s most outspoken domestic opponent, was arrested in January upon his return from Germany, where he spent five months recovering from a nerve-agent poisoning that he blames on the Kremlin. Russian authorities have rejected the accusation.

Navalny’s poisoning and conviction have further strained Russia’s ties with the United States and the European Union, which sank to post-Cold War lows after Moscow’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea, its meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, hacking attacks and other actions.

His arrest fueled a series of protests that drew tens of thousands across Russia. Authorities detained about 11,000 people, many of whom were fined or given jail terms of up to two weeks.

Navalny said the August poisoning made him wonder about the cause of his current ailments. He said he had no choice but to start a hunger strike because his physical condition has worsened, with back pains having spread to his right leg and numbness in his left leg.

“What else could I do?” he wrote. “I have declared a hunger strike demanding that they allow a visit by an invited doctor in compliance with the law. So I’m lying here, hungry, but still with two legs.”

Full Coverage: Russia
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Last month, Navalny was sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison for violating the terms of his probation during convalescence in Germany. The sentence stems from a 2014 embezzlement conviction that Navalny has rejected as fabricated — and which the European Сourt of Human Rights has ruled to be unlawful.

Navalny was moved this month from a Moscow jail to a penal colony in Pokrov in the Vladimir region, 85 kilometers (53 miles) east of the Russian capital. The facility called IK-2 stands out among Russian penitentiaries for its particularly strict inmate routines, which include standing to attention for hours.

Navalny’s Instagram also had a picture of a letter to the prison chief, dated Wednesday, in which he announced the hunger strike.

“Every convict has the right to invite a specialist for a check and consultation,” he wrote. “So I demand to let a doctor see me and declare a hunger strike until it happens.”

In a sarcastic reference to the nerve agent poisoning that he blamed on Russia’s top security agency, the FSB, Navalny wrote to the prison chief that “given a recent attempt by the FSB operatives to kill me with chemical weapons, which state-controlled medics cast as a ‘metaboliс problem,’ I’m haunted by vague doubts about the cause of my illness and recovery prospects.”

Russia’s prison service said last week that Navalny had undergone medical check-ups and described his condition as “stable and satisfactory.” In a statement that followed his declaration of a hunger strike, it claimed that Navalny is being given “all the necessary medical assistance in accordance with his current health indicators.”

But Navalny has complained that authorities only gave him basic painkiller pills and ointment for his back and legs while refusing to accept medications prescribed earlier by his doctor or to share the diagnosis from his examination.

In a note earlier this month, Navalny described his prison as a “friendly concentration camp.” He said he hadn’t seen “even a hint of violence” there but lived under controls that he compared to those described in George Orwell’s novel “Nineteen Eighty-Four.”

Earlier this week, he said he already had received six reprimands — warnings that could lead to solitary confinement — for offenses such as getting up 10 minutes before the wake-up call and refusing to watch a video lecture that he called “idiotic.”

Navalny, whom prison authorities had earlier marked as a flight risk, said he was subject to particularly close oversight, including a guard waking him up every hour at night and filming him to demonstrate he is in the required place.

“Instead of medical assistance, I’m subjected to sleep deprivation torture, being woken up eight times every night,” he said in Wednesday’s statement.

The prison service insisted that Navalny has been treated in strict conformity with the law and the night checks are part of a regular routine that “don’t disrupt convicts’ rest.”

During a video call with Putin on Tuesday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron emphasized the need for Russia to protect Navalny’s health and to respect his rights in compliance with the European Convention on Human Rights, according to Macron’s office.

The Kremlin said in its readout of the call that Putin offered an “objective explanation” in response to questions Merkel and Macron asked about Navalny.

Russian officials have rejected U.S. and EU demands to free Navalny and to stop a police crackdown on his supporters. Moscow also has rebuffed a European Court of Human Rights ruling in favor of his release as “inadmissible” meddling in Russia’s home affairs.

Navalny’s associates have urged Russians to sign up for the next protest to demand his release, promising to set a date for the demonstration when the number of people willing to take part reaches at least 500,000 nationwide.

More than 360,000 have registered since a dedicated website opened on March 23.

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MOSCOW (AP) — Russia’s defense minister said Tuesday that the country’s massive military buildup in the west was part of readiness drills amid what he described as threats from NATO.

Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said the maneuvers in western Russia that have worried neighboring Ukraine and brought warnings from NATO would last for another two weeks.

Speaking at a meeting with the top military brass, Shoigu said the ongoing exercise was a response to what he claimed were continuous efforts by the United States and its NATO allies to beef up their forces near Russia’s borders.

In the past three weeks, the Russian military has deployed two armies and three airborne formations to western regions “as a response to the alliance’s military activities threatening Russia,” the defense minister said.

“The troops have shown their full readiness to fulfill tasks to ensure the country’s security,” he said.

The U.S. and its allies have sounded alarm about the concentration of Russian troops along the border with Ukraine and increasing violations of a cease-fire in eastern Ukraine, where Russia-baсked separatists and Ukrainian forces have been locked in a conflict since Moscow’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula.

More than 14,000 people have died in fighting in eastern Ukraine, and efforts to negotiate a political settlement have stalled. The chief of NATO on Tuesday called the recent Russian deployment the largest concentration of troops near the Ukraine border since 2014.

The White House said U.S. President Joe Biden voiced concern over the Russian buildup and “called on Russia to de-escalate tensions,” during a phone call Tuesday with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

In separate meetings with Ukraine’s foreign minister, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg strong support for Ukraine and warned Russia against pressing ahead with its troop buildup along the former Soviet republic’s eastern border.

Amid the recent tensions, the United States notified Turkey that two U.S. warships would sail to the Black Sea on April 14 and April 15 and stay there until May 4 and May 5. The U.S. Navy ships have made regular visits to the Black Sea in past years, vexing Moscow.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov denounced the latest deployment as “openly provocative,” adding that “American ships have absolutely nothing to do near our shores.”

“They are testing our strength and playing on our nerves,” Ryabkov said in remarks carried by Russian news agencies. “Seeing itself as the Queen of the Seas, the U.S. should realize that the risks of various incidents are very high. We warn the U.S. that it should stay away from Crimea and our Black Sea coast for their own benefit.”

NATO chief Stoltenberg expressed the Western military alliance’s “unwavering” support for Ukraine during a news conference on Tuesday with Ukraine’s foreign minister, calling the Russian movements “unjustified, unexplained and deeply concerning.”

The Kremlin has argued that Russia is free to deploy its troops wherever it wants on its territory and has repeatedly accused the Ukrainian military of “provocative actions” along the line of control in the east and of planning to retake control of the rebel regions by force.

Ryabkov reaffirmed Tuesday that “if there is any escalation, we will do everything to ensure our own security and the security of our citizens whenever they are,” adding that “Kyiv and its Western curators will bear all the responsibility for the consequences of that hypothetical escalation.”

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mooray said:

Yeah man this is bullshit, same old cold war proxy tactics. I don't want those US warships over there just yet. Ukraine has been an EU nation since 2014, so let those EU nations put the heat on for a bit before we get involved.

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DIY-HP-LED said:

Yep nothing like a divide and conquer strategy. This is an NATO problem, but it is really a UN problem and is in violation of the the UN charter. Russia invaded and occupied another sovereign country and needs to be not just ejected from the Ukraine but punished as well. I'm Canadian and would favor putting Canadians on the line over this and once action was decided anybody in NATO who doesn't demonstrate solidarity should be expelled and sanctions applied. Vlad will push until we not just push back, but kick him in the nuts and then the teeth, repeatedly when he's down. I think we should prepare and when the covid crises is over, act. Until then supply arms, advisors and the technology to kill shockingly large numbers of Russian troops on Ukrainian territory quickly.

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mooray said:

Right there with you. He's a real "give an inch and he'll take a mile" kind of guy. And I know we're not without our dirty laundry, but invading other nations is intolerable enough to lay it all on the line.

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DIY-HP-LED said:

I'm Canadian and would favor putting Canadians on the line over this

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mooray said:

Ukraine has been an EU nation since 2014, so let those EU nations put the heat on for a bit before we get involved.

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mooray said:

Ahhhhh my mistake, thanks for the correction. They signed an economic agreement with the EU in 2014. I doubt any of the eastern bloc countries wanting to join are very popular, especially since I'm guessing most/all would not be net contributors.

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Sativied said:

Right, and not just in a monetary way. The idea was the more nations join, the more they’d be lifted to the levels of democracy, freedoms and prosperity of the founding nations. The opposite happens. That economic agreement was also the beginning of the end of public referenda in NL (we voted No, we have a veto right as founder, but parliament still went ahead and signed). EU is all about money, there’s no moral unity that will result in hard support for Ukraine. I guess they’ll have no choice to join if Biden takes military action but I don’t think Putin is that stupid to go far enough for that to happen. Russia bad sure, but that doesn’t make Ukraine the good guys. Zelensky is TV show personality and populist who came to power in the oligarchy Ukraine with the help of a media mogul. ‘nuff said.

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Sativied said:

Over what exactly? Helping Russians in Crimea to rejoin Ukraine instead of mother Russia against their will? 2/3rd of Crimea‘s population are Russians, only a 6th is Ukranian. A large portion of its original population (Tatars) was deported by Stalin 75 years ago. The majority of the “Crimeans” talk Russian, watch Russian TV, adhere to Russian orthodox church, and want to be part of Russia, again. It’s partly still the aftermath of the collapse of the soviet union and older history that makes the borders there more fluid than the west thinks borders should be. Doesn’t seem like a good reason to put Canadians on the line. The whole situation at their borders right now is a farce, not a scheme. Just like the downing of mh17.


Ukraine is not a member of the EU. They want to apply in 2024 and I very much doubt they’ll be allowed to join. Ukraine isn’t particularly popular in the EU.

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Sativied said:

Right, and not just in a monetary way. The idea was the more nations join, the more they’d be lifted to the levels of democracy, freedoms and prosperity of the founding nations. The opposite happens. That economic agreement was also the beginning of the end of public referenda in NL (we voted No, we have a veto right as founder, but parliament still went ahead and signed). EU is all about money, there’s no moral unity that will result in hard support for Ukraine. I guess they’ll have no choice to join if Biden takes military action but I don’t think Putin is that stupid to go far enough for that to happen. Russia bad sure, but that doesn’t make Ukraine the good guys. Zelensky is TV show personality and populist who came to power in the oligarchy Ukraine with the help of a media mogul. ‘nuff said.

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