Groobs
Lounge Lizard
Joined: 15 Oct 2006
Posts: 83
Location: China (but missing St Pete!)
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 Posted: Sat Mar 10, 2007 6:23 am Post subject: St Pete democracy march with pics - a depressing event |
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Hi guys – I am 2 months out of Russia now, in Singapore, but still my Russian friends keep me posted on things happening there. Thought I would share this story with you – my good Russian friend Alex sent me an email the other day about the recent protest march against Putin in St Petersburg – I should say that in my “liberal” democracy (UK – despite Blair’s attempts to create some kind of micro-managed police state) this would be nothing more than some sort of irritation to those trying to drive thru the centre of the city – in Russia, it’s tantamount to a capital offence, and the police react accordingly…..
Not for Russia the concept of a happy, if boisterous, crowd waving banners and chanting - in Putin’s Russia it’s an excuse for baton charges, random arrest, beatings, detention, and generally kicking the shit out of genuine protest.
OK – to introduce what follows, I am going to post the text of the email Alex sent me, I have not changed it, nor corrected his English, but simply posted it to give you a flavour of what he tells me is happening,,,,,,,
And also, I am posting his photos of the day,,,,,,,,, make your own mind up,,,,,
Here is the mail:
”””””I participated in the demonstration of protest against Putin’s politics in
Saint Petersburg last Sunday.
I saw from 5000 and up to 12 000 people in different time. The government prohibited the event and certainly did it against the constitution and
against the law. The Police accounted at least 400 policemen and special
police forces “OMON”, existing basically to suppress demonstrations.
During the event Protesters did not break any single class. They were
smiling and friendly. Most of people, who had became a witness, joined the
crowd.
The police was brutal. The arrests started a few days before the event. I
saw, how, 20 minutes before the start of the meeting, was beatten E. Limonov and several young people. As regular citizens, they were walking down the
street in the moment as two OMON buses stopped and few gorillas jumped out.
The police unproportionally used batons and kicked everybody before throwing them into cars.
Police arrested more than 100 activists by attacking peacefully walking
people. However, neither arrests, nor armed cars, stop the movement. People, like water were flowing through vehicles and by Petersburg courtyards from Ploshad Vosstaniya towards Hermitage.
Only, after demonstrators had notices around 200 OMON armed “nights”,
standing like a wall in 2 rows on Griboedov Canal, the leaders decided to
stop near the old city legislation (Gorodskaya Duma) on Nevsky Prospect and gave their final speeches. The tower of the old Duma turned into a natural tribune. It took about 20 minutes as police regrouped and attacked the tower beating and arresting activists.””””””””””
Well, my view is, and has long been based on my time there, that Russia really must wake up and smell the coffee – if it actually were capable of respecting the rule of law and the concept of differing opinions and political freedom of expression, and if it could wean itself off this crushing over-bearing belief that the state must control, then it might even become a truly great power in the 21st century (and by great here I mean one that not just has mountains of petro-dollars, but one that others might respect and admire and even seek to emulate – but as it is, it seems to me at the moment Russia is just relapsing into some obscene caricature of the decline of the roman empire, with all the abuses and obscene excesses that characterized its decline,,,,,,,,,,,
By the way, as for the poster on this site (sorry, I can’t remember the name) who is going to march in a gay rights parade in Moscow, well, while I 100% respect you and your determination to do that, I should warn you that your march WILL get the crap beaten out of you, and worse......... and it won’t just be the police/militia, it will probably be a depressingly large proportion of the population who on this matter will agree with them – not that I am advocating giving up, but I just feel that it could be a really deeply horrible experience, so do please take such care as you can and good luck. Sorry, but Russia is pretty neanderthal in its attitudes to political dissent, race and sexuality. (IMHO).
And here are the pics (it wont let me post them all in one message so I will try and put them in the next following posts)
This is right in the middle of Nevsky Prospect – Gostiny Dvor department store on the right.
This is as you can see right out on Nevsky in front of Grand Hotel Europe – not what you expect to see out of the window for your $500 a night…… |
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