With a new mayor and a rift between rally organizers, nobody knew what to expect from Moscow’s Strategy 31 rally. When the three organizers – Moscow Helsinki Group head Lyudmila Alexeyeva, National Bolshevik leader Eduard Limonov, and Left Front representative Konstantin Kosyakin – were told by the mayor’s office that they would be allowed to hold a rally for no more than 200 people on Triumfalnaya Square, it was both the first time ever that such permission had been granted and the first time that the trio had become so split on how to respond. Alexeyeva came to an agreement with the mayor’s office to allow a rally for 800, while Limonov and Kosyakin chose to split off and hold a separate rally – on the same square, at the same time, and still under the banner of Strategy 31 – unsanctioned and thus more liable to a police crackdown, but for as many people as wanted to come.

According to Gazeta.ru, Moscow city police were given an order ahead of the rally to avoid detaining participants and to behave in an appropriate fashion. To ensure this, Police Chief Vladimir Kolokoltsev and the new deputy mayor in charge of work with city law enforcement, Vladimir Shukshin, were present at the rally to observe. Presidential rights advisor Mikhail Fedotov and federal Human Rights Ombudsman Vladimir Lukin also came as observers.  And it showed. Metal detectors were set up at the entrance to the sanctioned part of the rally, and police stopped traffic to allow activists arriving from the metro to cross the street. OMON riot police, who are most often noted in the media for their particularly brutal treatment of opposition protesters, were heard yelling into a microphone: “Go to Alexeyeva, she’s waiting for you.” About 1000 showed up for the sanctioned event.

Protesters who chose to join with Limonov and Kosyakin were forced to squish onto the terrace outside the Tchaikovsky Concert Hall, which borders Triumfalnaya Square. At the height of the rally, the crowd was estimated at between 1500-2000 people. Police made several detentions when activists from the unsanctioned rally attempted to saw open the barrier that is currently blocking off the majority of Triumfalnaya Square for construction. Another two were detained for setting off smoke bombs.

A half hour after the rally began, police formed a human chain and began to push the unsanctioned crowd towards Alexeyeva’s event, knocking over the metal detectors in the process. According to Ekho Moskvy radio, Limonov himself was hoisted by his arms and legs over that part of the square. Once inside, ralliers were not allowed back out.

While this was going on, Lyudmila Alexeyeva and singer Katya Gordon were giving speeches to their crowd, with Gordon shaming the police for jamming Limonov’s ralliers together and Alexeyeva hailing the sanctioned event as “our shared achievement.” “I want to thank you for coming to Triumfalnaya Square on every 31st date for the course of a year and a half,” said the elderly rights activist. “We must force the government to treat our rights with respect.”

A number of notable civic organizations had representatives at Alexeyeva’s rally, including Lev Ponomarev of For Human Rights, Left Front leader Sergei Udaltsov, Solidarity members Boris Nemtsov, Ilya Yashin, Sergei Davidis, and Oleg Kozlovsky, Khimki Forest defense activist Yevgeniya Chirkova, and representatives from the Memorial human rights center. Nemtsov decried the conflict between the Strategy 31 organizers, saying that “we mustn’t give the Kremlin such a gift as a schism.” He then proposed that ralliers gather once again on December 31 and end their rally by marching on the Kremlin.

After an hour, the sanctioned rally was over, and both organizers and police began asking people to leave. However, a group of between 300-800 people broke off and began marching south down the Garden Ring towards the Russian White House, blocking traffic and apparently taking Nemtsov’s words as a call to immediate action. Police broke up the crowd amidst cries of “it’s our city!” and “revolution!”

At that point, most of the marchers scattered, but about 30 reformed and continued to march on the White House. Mobile Twitter messages from those present gave some insight into the group’s mentality. “Part of the group has set off for the White House, IMHO in vain: you really need to know when to stop,” tweeted Solidarity member Oleg Kozlovsky.

According to reporter Ilya Azar, “Nobody knows where the White House is. Kozlovsky is asking people not to go and nobody is listening to him.” Eventually, OMON riot police caught up with the marchers, and half ran away. Gazeta.ru reported that seven were detained right outside of the White House entrance, including activist Marina Litvinovich, Kasparov.ru correspondent Pavel Nikulin, and Polit.ru journalist Maria Klimova.

The total 38 detainees were released on Monday morning from holding cells in Moscow, according to Other Russia representative Aleksandr Averin.

Two separate rallies in defense of free assembly were also held in St. Petersburg on Sunday. About 1000 people gathered at Gostiny Dvor, were police immediately began making detentions. Another 300 people rallied at Dvortsovaya Square. Police began detaining those activists after they unfurled a 30-meter-long Russian flag.

Other Strategy 31 events were held in the Russian cities of Vladivostok, Kurgan, Penza, Murmansk, Tver, Ekaterinburg, Samara, Astrakhan, Sochi, Ryazan, Krasnodarsk, and others, largely without incident.

For the second time in a row, about 50 protesters also held a solidarity rally outside of the Russian embassy in London. Participants included exiled oligarch Boris Berezovsky, former Soviet dissident Vladimir Bukovsky, and Marina Litvinenko, the widow of murdered ex-FSB officer Alexander Litvinenko.

Video from RIA Novosti on the Moscow protest (in Russian):

Tuesday’s rally marked the eleventh iteration of the opposition’s Strategy 31 campaign. About 2000 people came out to Moscow’s Triumfalnaya Square to take part in the event, making it the largest rally in the campaign’s history.

As with the previous ten rallies, Moscow city authorities turned down an application by Strategy 31 organizers to obtain legal sanction to hold the event. Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov defended this permission-based system in a session of the city government earlier in the day, saying that the city’s decision to allow or disallow any given rally is not due to any “particular love” for certain rally organizers, but to considerations for public safety.

“Before every event in the capital, we take all necessary organizational measures to assure total safety for the people,” said the mayor, noting that anyone who wishes to hold a demonstration can file an application with the city and receive a decision within ten days.

The system will remain as it is, he went on, “and in the future we will continue to carry out this work in accordance with the law.”

“We will now allow chaos in Moscow,” Luzhkov stressed.

Luzhkov’s statements appear to contradict the Russian federal law that governs rallies, marches and demonstrations, which requires only a notification – not an application for permission – to be filed with the city in order to hold such an event.

Tuesday’s rally was scheduled to begin at 6:00 pm, and by that time Triumfalnaya Square had already been completely cordoned off by OMON riot police and internal military forces. According to a Kasparov.ru correspondent, the police left no free space for ralliers to gather. About 50 police buses bordered the perimeter of the square, and police blocked all pedestrians from entering. Part of the sidewalk between the Tchaikovsky Concert Hall and Triumfalnaya Square, where Strategy 31 ralliers have previously gathered when the square itself was blocked off, was also cordoned off.

Strategy 31 organizers issued a statement of concern on Tuesday morning regarding an interview with Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin that had been published the day before. In the interview, the prime minister charged that the real goal of Strategy 31 participants “is to get bludgeoned upside the head,” and that ralliers routinely provoke police into acting violently. In their response, rally organizers rejected the accusation and stated that any “possible incidents” of violence at the rally would be Putin’s personal responsibility.

At the same time, Moscow City Police Chief Vladimir Kolokoltsev did promise to train his officers to detain activists using less painful methods. There was no apparent option to simply not detain any ralliers at all – Deputy Police Chief Vyacheslav Kozlov said that the unsanctioned rally would be duly broken up.

A three-person delegation from the European Parliament, headed by Human Rights Committee Chairwoman Heidi Hautala, was present at the rally at the invitation of Strategy 31 organizers. Deputy Chief Kozlov said ahead of time that the delegates would not be excluded from possible detention.

According to a count by Kasparov.ru correspondents, approximately 2000 ralliers gathered on Triumfalnaya Square despite the heavy police presence and the fact that the square itself is almost entirely barricaded off for construction. Nevertheless, participants managed to rally for nearly two and a half hours, chanting opposition slogans that called for Putin to step down and for the 31st article of the Russian constitution, which guarantees free assembly, to be observed.

Moscow city police and Federal Security Service (FSB) agents reportedly created a jam in the crowd while attempting to push the ralliers away from the square, but did not manage to break up the protest.

Kasparov.ru estimates that approximately 100 people were detained during the course of the rally, including leading opposition activists Boris Nemtsov, Ilya Yashin, Sergei Udaltsov, and Roman Dobrokhotov. Two of the three Strategy 31 organizers, Eduard Limonov and Konstantin Kosyakin, were also detained. The third organizer, Moscow Helsinki Group head and former Soviet dissident Lyudmila Alexeyeva, was present at the rally but was not detained.

Official figures from the Moscow City Police cite 70 detainees, and put the number of people present at the rally at 400 people, including 300 journalists.

Eyewitnesses noted that police did not refrain from acting violently while detaining rally participants. Several activists were seen with bloody faces after having been beaten by law enforcement agents. The first participant to be detained was an activist holding a poster picturing Russia’s symbolic two-headed eagle – one head being that of Russian President Dmitri Medvedev and the other of Vladimir Putin.

As of 10:00 pm, several of the most high-profile detainees had been released, including Nemtsov and Limonov. Nemtsov was told that he had supposedly blocked pedestrian movement during the rally and had been detained on that basis. They and several other activists were charged with “violating the established procedure for arranging or conducting a meeting, rally, demonstration, procession, or picket,” an administrative violation punishable by a small fine. As of Tuesday night, approximately 80 detainees remained in various Moscow police stations.

Strategy 31 rallies were also held on Tuesday in various cities throughout Russia, with several solidarity events also taking place in Europe. Approximately 80 out of 700 ralliers were detained in an event in St. Petersburg, and rallies were held with varying levels of success or suppression in Omsk, Yaroslav, Sochi, Voronezh, Makhachkala, and numerous other Russian cities. One event in London included the participation of refugee Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky and the widow of murdered ex-FSB agent Alexander Litvinenko, Marina Litvinenko.

Litvinenko, a former KGB officer and vocal critic of former Russian President Vladimir Putin, was poisoned with a radioactive substance in London in 2006. One high-ranking official said he had “very strong indications it was a state action.”

British investigators have complained that Russian authorities have not been cooperative. Citing a law barring extradition for its citizens, Russia has refused to hand over Andrei Lugovoi, another former KGB officer suspected by UK authorities of the murder. Lugovoi maintains his innocence.

MI5 officers also said they had averted an assassination attempt against Boris Berezovsky, a wealthy Russian oligarch living in exile in London. Russia has previously tried to extradite Berezovsky, a vocal Putin critic charged with fraud and political corruption.

Relations between the UK and Russia reached post Cold-war lows after the Litvinenko murder, and have remained rocky ever since. The Times newspaper reported on July 4th that British security services see Russia as the third most serious threat facing the country, after Iran and Al-Qaeda.

Other officials told the Telegraph newspaper that that Russia’s spy efforts in the country have taken resources away from fighting terrorism.

“MI5’s resources have been stretched to the limit for the past few years,” one source said. “There have been times when there was nothing left in the locker, when all of our assets were being used on one operation.”

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Russian President Dmitri Medvedev are currently meeting at talks of the Group of 8 in Japan.

When he found out what was being said about his remarks, Berezovsky quickly denied supporting Other Russia and denied claiming to have said he did. We are quite certain that had the interviewer added something such as “Kasparov” or otherwise made it clear — perhaps speaking in Russian instead of challenging Berezovsky’s English in a noisy room — this latest farce could have been avoided. Or are we supposed to believe that after repeated denials, Berezovsky would suddenly change his mind and confess to a “crime” he did not commit? And that he would do this one week after he stated in an interview with the Russian National Journal that he had “never given a penny” to Other Russia and had “never been asked to”? Such behavior is well below the journalistic standards of the Financial Times.

The Other Russia coalition yet again denies any involvement with Berezovsky, as today’s statements from Garry Kasparov and United Civil Front executive director Denis Bilunov make clear.