Alexei Navalny was recently arrested upon his arrival in Russia from Germany. In Moscow, St. Petersburg, Yakutsk, and nearly 70 other cities, Russians protested in support of Navalny.
Massive protests took place across Russia on Saturday in support of Alexei Navalny, a Russian opposition leader and vocal critic of President Vladimir Putin. Navalny was arrested last Sunday after returning to Moscow from Germany, where he was treated for a poisoning allegedly linked to the Kremlin five months earlier. According to Reuters, about 40,000 people took part in the Moscow demonstrations, although police called that number incorrect, estimating the crowd at 4,000. Several thousands more participated in cities across the country, from Yakutsk in the northeast to St. Petersburg in the west, and about 3,000 demonstrators have been arrested in all. Protesters were met by a strong police presence — and government officials had urged citizens to stay home, arguing that the rallies did not have proper authorization. “Respected citizens, the current event is illegal,” police reportedly announced during the demonstration in Moscow. “We are doing everything to ensure your safety.” Few protesters heeded these warnings, and the number of those arrested in protests in Moscow, St. Petersburg, and about 70 other towns and cities swelled to at least 3,000, according to reports from the human rights monitoring group OVD-Info. That includes about 1,100 people in Moscow alone, as of 11:30 pm Moscow time on Saturday. Navalny’s wife, Yulia Navalnaya, was among those arrested at this weekend’s protests. Heads of his party’s regional offices have also been detained in advance of the protests, as well as members of Navalny’s team, including his press secretary, Kira Yarmysh. Navalny’s arrest — and the detentions of his team — have galvanized a tremendous mass movement. The size of the Moscow protests is reminiscent of the summer of 2019, when at least 60,000 people demonstrated in that city to demand fair elections. (Navalny was arrested in advance of that movement, too.) While many of the protesters were Navalny’s supporters, others said they came out more because they want to see a sweeping end to Putin’s authoritarian rule. “I was never a big supporter of Navalny, and yet I understand perfectly well that this is a very serious situation,” Vitaliy Blazhevich — who, at 57, was one of the demonstration’s more senior participants — told the New York Times.
