In an interview with the paper published on August 30, the prime minister spoke of the opposition using notably dirty language and said that the actual goal of participants in the opposition’s Strategy 31 campaign “is to get bludgeoned upside the head.”

Noting that permission must be obtained from city authorities to hold large rallies, Putin said that Russian oppositionists act in a way that says “we’ll do what we want, and we’re going to provoke you so that you bludgeon us upside the head. And, dousing ourselves with red paint, we’ll say that the anti-people government is acting disgracefully and is suppressing human rights.”

In June, Russia’s presidentially-appointed human rights ombudsman, Vladimir Lukin, came out with a statement that the idea that rallies require sanction from the government to be held legally is actually completely false. All that the law requires, he said, was for event organizers to give the city a declaration of their intended actions.

While Strategy 31 organizers routinely apply with the Moscow city authorities for permission to hold their rallies, it has never once been granted. Ralliers who gather despite the lack of sanction are routinely beaten by riot police and internal military forces, a trend that has drawn criticism from governments and rights organizations across the globe.

The prime minister insisted that he was unaware of Strategy 31 until his scandalous meeting with Kremlin-critical rock musician Yury Shevchuk in May, and that the decisions to disperse the rallies and to close Triumfalnaya Square (where the rallies are always held) for construction were taken without his knowledge. “I give you my honest word as a party member,” he declared in an expression harking back to Soviet times.

The decision to close Triumfalnaya Square in order to build an underground parking garage was announced in mid-August. The abrupt decision took oppositionists and Russian civil society on the whole by surprise, and many have denounced the project as an excuse to put an end to the Strategy 31 protests. According to city officials, the square will be not be reopened earlier than 2012. Despite this, Strategy 31 organizers intend to continue their rallies, with the next event scheduled for tomorrow – August 31, 2010.

A group of youth activists attending Seliger 2010, a summer-long camp that was founded as a training ground for the pro-Kremlin youth group Nashi but is now run directly by the federal government, erected a row of 13 plastic heads on sticks. Each head has a hats bearing Nazi symbols and a picture of a different Russian public figure, including former Soviet dissident Lyudmila Alexeyeva, musician Yury Shevchuk, and jailed oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky.

The installation was originally thought to be organized by Nashi itself, but was later found to be the work of a smaller pro-Kremlin youth group called Stal (“Steel”). According to the group’s LiveJournal page, Stal is a “patriotic movement created for the unification of thinkers and prepared for decisive action for the sake of its country, for the sake of Russia, of youth.” They also call themselves “the weaponry of Russia.”

According to Ekho Moskvy radio, Russian Human Rights Ombudsman Vladimir Lukin is deeply enraged by the installation. He said that it would be hard to do more damage to Russia’s reputation and that the organizers should be severely punished.

Russian bloggers immediately pointed out that the installation violates a federal law banning the public demonstration of Nazi symbolism.

Members of the Public Chamber, a federal body meant to foster dialogue between civil society and the government, called for a full boycott of the camp.

“I am deeply outraged that our best human rights advocates and well-known public figures – Lyudmila Alexeyeva, Nikolai Svanidze – are compared to Nazis,” said Alla Gerber, Public Chamber member and president of the Interregional Holocaust Foundation. “The authors of this installation are irresponsible hooligans, absolutely insane people who don’t know what Nazis are.”

Nashi defended Seliger 2010 for allowing different youth movements to express different points of view, Stal’s being no exception. In a statement posted on its website on Wednesday, Nashi said that the camp’s administration “does not subject participants’ statements to censorship, does not participate in the preparation of installations, does not pay for art objects that delegations bring along.”

Lyudmila Alexeyeva told Ekho Moskvy that public figures would do best to ignore such incidents, and thus she does not plan to file suit for slander against the installation’s organizers.

“Things like this don’t offend me,” said Alexeyeva. “And really, if they originate with Nashi, then excuse me, who is there to be offended by – those who make do without any human qualities, decency, or intelligence? Let them amuse themselves in this ugly fashion. Put up a caricature of an old woman who already looks sufficiently morose. If my grandchildren did this, then I would explain to them that good children don’t do this. But here I’m not going to explain anything.”

Aleksandr Averin of the Other Russia opposition party said that the July 20 ruling gives oppositionists the opportunity to have the case reexamined by the Tverskoy Court.

The banned rally was part of the opposition’s Strategy 31 campaign, which holds demonstrations on the 31st of every month with that date in defense of the constitutional right to free assembly. Article 31 of the Russian constitution enshrines this right, hence the name and date. As holding unsanctioned rallies is punishable under Russian federal law, Strategy 31 organizers routinely file applications for official sanction with the Moscow mayor’s office. However, they are consistently refused – as was the case for the December 31 event.

However, documents obtained with the help of Russian Human Rights Ombudsman Vladimir Lukin convinced the Moscow City Court that the city’s refusal to sanction the rally needs to be reconsidered.

Usually, Moscow city authorities refuse to sanction Strategy 31 events under the pretense that other events have already been planned for the same time and place. While the December 31 event was refused sanction on this basis on December 22, the newly-revealed documents show that the place in question, Moscow’s central Triumfalnaya Square, was actually free until December 29. Only then was an event planned for the very time and place where the Moscow authorities knew the oppositionists were intent on holding their rally.

Averin said that by overturning the Tverskoy Court ruling, the Moscow City Court has effectively admitted that the Moscow authorities’ refusal to sanction Strategy 31 rallies is politically motivated and has nothing to do with a conflict of events.

The decision comes just a day after Strategy 31 organizers were denied sanction for an upcoming rally on July 31.

Former Soviet Dissident and Strategy-31 co-organizer Lyudmila Alexeyeva said that an official from the mayor’s office called to inform her on July 19 that the rally could be held at several other locations, but not on Triumfalnaya Square – which has already long since become a traditional gathering place for Strategy 31 participants.

“I didn’t even ask for a reason,” said Alexeyeva. “I’m not interested. It’s the same thing over and over again.”

Speaking to Gazeta.ru, former Deputy Prime Minister and co-leader of the Solidarity opposition movement Boris Nemtsov said that the offer came several days ago from Vladislav Surkov, a primary Kremlin ideologist and highly influential aid to both the president and prime minister. Nemtsov refrained from specifying precisely to whom the proposition was made, but reports cite that it was to the “moderate” wing of the Russian opposition. Nemtsov denied that Surkov made the proposal directly to him, as some sources were reporting.

Left Front opposition leader Sergei Udaltsov expressed certainty that the Kremlin met with representatives from Solidarity, “since the Kremlin considers them to be moderate figures.”

According to Limonov himself, the offer was made both to Nemtsov and noted human rights advocate Lev Ponomarev, who heads the organization For Human Rights and is also part of Solidarity’s leadership. “At first they confirmed it. Then, clearly, they began to shy away – because now they have connections in the Kremlin,” he said.

Limonov, whose National Bolshevik Party is officially banned by the Russian government, characterized the proposal by the presidential administration as “the arrogance of a government that doesn’t want to give into Limonov.” He added that he has no intention of giving up his post as Strategy 31 organizer: “You cannot make concessions to the government: today they’re asking to sacrifice Limonov, but tomorrow it’ll be Limonov’s children.”

Meanwhile, the Kremlin denied the existence of any contact with the opposition at all. One high-level presidential representative, speaking under condition of anonymity to Gazeta.ru, said that he had no knowledge of any such negotiations.

In any case, opposition leaders are categorically refusing to abandon Limonov.

“I think the proposal is obscene,” Nemtsov said, noting that Limonov and his supporters had participated in Strategy 31 since the very beginning in July 2009. “And although it’s now a shared event, nobody has the right to start colluding with the government in this regard,” he concluded.

Vsevolod Chernozub, co-chairman of the Moscow branch of Solidarity, commented that the Kremlin’s proposal “reflects the cop-like and Chekist style of thinking of the current government.”

Strategy 31’s organizational committee has routinely consisted of Limonov, former Soviet dissident and Moscow Helsinki Group head Lyudmila Alexeyeva, and Left Front representative Konstantin Kosyakin. The three have applied to the Moscow mayor’s office for official sanction on seven separate occasions – on each month with a 31st date – and have been denied every time.

Alexeyeva also said that she had no plans to exclude Limonov for the upcoming rally on July 31. “I’m in favor of holding consultations with the Moscow government, as is required by law. Like always, three representatives of the event will hold these consultations,” she told Gazeta.ru.

Limonov added that, as a Strategy 31 organizer, he is currently participating in mediation procedures with Russian Human Rights Ombudsman Vladimir Lukin and Moscow Human Rights Ombudsman Aleksandr Muzykantsky. Their most recent session was held on June 1, one day after police violently broke up May’s Strategy 31 rally. During that meeting, said Limonov, a different proposition was made: “The July 31 event could be held on Pushkin Square, and then as a reward they would supposedly give us Triumfalnaya [the next month], and the next time again on Pushkin, and so on,” he explained. “But I said that this was unacceptable to us: we aren’t migrant workers who can be driven back and forth.”

The Kremlin offer comes two weeks after Limonov announced the creation of a political party based on the Other Russia opposition coalition and his intentions to lead the party in upcoming parliamentary elections. Reports about the Kremlin proposal itself come on the same day as the pro-Kremlin youth organization Young Guard announced that they have been denied sanction by the Moscow authorities to hold an event on Triumfalnaya Square on July 31 – the same date and place where the Strategy 31 rally is planned to be held. A representative from the Moscow regional government told Gazeta.ru that a three-day automobile festival has been planned for the last weekend in July on Triumfalnaya Square.

The leadership of Young Russia confirmed that they had been denied sanction for their event, and also expressed a great deal of disbelief. As has been the pattern until now, Strategy 31 opposition leaders are continually denied sanction for their own rallies, with one commonly-given excuse being that pro-Kremlin youth groups have already applied to use the same space at the same time.

In a column published today on Grani.ru, Strategy 31 co-organizer Eduard Limonov said that two people who said that Russian President Dmitri Medvedev had charged them with “settling the conflict on Triumfalnaya” met with him and co-organizers Lyudmila Alexeyeva and Konstantin Kosyakin the day after police detained about 170 activists at their May 31 event. The rally, held on Moscow’s central Triumfalnaya Square, had been dedicated to the defense of the constitutional right to free assembly and had not been sanctioned by city authorities.

At the meeting, said Limonov, the two government representatives proposed the following plan: Strategy 31 organizers would be given permission to rally on nearby Pushkin Square on July 31, and then on Triumfalnaya Square on August 31. Their following rally could then be held on Pushkin Square, and in this manner the activists would be allowed to alternate back and forth between the two locations.

The negotiators added that such an arrangement would allow the government “to save face,” Limonov said.

In his turn, Limonov proposed his own alternative: that the Russian Supreme Court be allowed to rule whether or not it is illegal for the opposition to hold Strategy 31 rallies on Triumfalnaya Square. Such a proposal failed to suit the government representatives, who Limonov said responded that if that happened, “the public will say that the government broke under the pressure of Limonov, and that is inadmissible.”

The organizers agreed several days later not to accept the government proposal, Limonov went on, and both sides agreed to take a “time out” until later in June to continue negotiations.

The Strategy 31 rallies have been continually banned by Moscow city authorities under a number of pretexts since their inception in May 2009. While the city government, as is required by federal law, continually proposes alternative locations for the opposition to hold its events, the activists maintain that these locations would render them virtually invisible to the public at large. This, they say, would make their event, which is meant to inform citizens of their constitutional right to free assembly and assert that right themselves, pointless.

While government loyalists and other critics say that the oppositionists should be content to rally at the alternative locations proposed by the city and accuse them of intentionally provoking the authorities by holding rallies that they know will not be sanctioned, Strategy 31 organizers insist that the government has no right to limit their place of protest, and that legislation allowing the government to deny sanction to a rally violates the constitution. Russian Human Rights Ombudsman Vladimir Lukin said earlier this month that the 170 detentions by police at the May 31 event were “illegal” and that the idea of a “sanctioned action” does not actually exist in Russian law. Instead, according to the constitution, organizers are only required to notify the local government if they plan to hold a large demonstration, he said.

The vote was split down party lines, with the Kremlin-backed United Russia party voting as a bloc in favor of the bill. All deputies from the three other parties voted against it.

The bill was introduced by the Russian federal government on April 24. It will allow the FSB to issue preemptive warnings to individuals or groups that the agency suspects of acting in a way that could potentially become “extremist.” Such extremist activity, it claims, is on the rise in Russia today.

Specifically, the legislation will now allow the FSB to employ “special preventative measures” in order to “eliminate causes and conditions that are conducive to the realization of threats to security” and to issue “official warning notifications about the inadmissibility of actions that bring about the creation of causes of, and which create the conditions for, committing crime.”

What does that mean? In principle, it means that the FSB can do whatever it decides must be done to prevent situations that, theoretically, could lead to a crime being committed.

What that’s going to look like in practice remains to be seen. Experts warn that the legislation is so vague that the agency could easily use it to severely impede upon normal social activism and the normal operation of the press, leading to greater self-censorship by anyone critical of government policy. This concern stems from the fact that allegations of extremism are routinely used by Russian law enforcement agents to stifle legal forms of dissent by human rights activists, oppositionists, artists, journalists, and others.

Vladimir Lukin, the federal human rights ombudsman reappointed by President Dmitri Medvedev in 2009, said that the law was dangerous and discredits the FSB. But calls by critics to veto the legislation expect to go unheeded by the president, as it was the federal government that introduced the bill in the first place.

Dmitri Peskov, press secretary for Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, said that the prime minister was aware of Monday’s events, but stressed that the rally was not held in a location sanctioned by the Moscow city government.

“The prime minister, of course, knows about the demonstration. He knows, in particular, where it was given permission to be held and where it was actually held,” said Peskov.

Putin made a guarded statement last week that protests should always be allowed if their participants follow the law, after being confronted about the issue by a Kremlin-critical rock musician. But as the Moscow Times points out:

City officials banned the rally on Triumfalnaya Ploshchad, saying an authorized pro-Kremlin rally was already scheduled to take place instead.

Preventing unwanted public gatherings by holding official rallies is a well-known tactic. In his 2000 book of interviews, “From the First Person. Conversations with Vladimir Putin,” Putin admitted to using it himself when working in the St. Petersburg administration in the 1990s.

When asked what the prime minister thought about the actions of the police – which included detaining up to 170 people, beating dozens of them, holding them for hours in buses that were more than 95°F, shattering one man’s arm, and manhandling a World War II veteran – Peskov declined to comment.

Any discussion of the incident was blocked in the State Duma on Wednesday by United Russia, the country’s leading political party headed by Vladimir Putin. Communist Party Deputy Sergei Obukhov tried to raise the issue but was shot down by First Deputy Speaker Oleg Morozov, who condemned him for giving an unsanctioned presentation.

Meanwhile, Moscow Human Rights Ombudsman Aleksandr Muzykantsky said that he takes issue with the fact that youth activists routinely hold events on Triumfalnaya Square on the 31st of every month – the same time the Strategy 31 rallies are meant to take place – thus providing the city government with a formal way to refuse to sanction the oppositionists’ event.

“It brings to mind how in the 20s of the last century they [Stalin loyalists – ed.] would disrupt Trotskyist meetings by using young people who stirred up fights. Those who disrupted the meetings were, in the end, convicted of taking part in Trotskyist rallies,” said Muzykantsky, as quoted by Interfax. “Young people were used cynically, and then they were thrown out.”

He added that he pitied the young people who are attracted to taking part in the events that are meant to disrupt the Strategy 31 rallies.

Russian Human Rights Ombudsman Vladimir Lukin, who joined Muzykantsky at Monday’s rally as an observer (and who police attempted to arrest), called the detentions “illegal” and said that the idea of a “sanctioned action” does not actually exist in Russian legislation. Instead, according to the constitution, organizers are only required to notify the local government if they plan to hold a large demonstration, he said.

Just as a two-day summit between Russia and the European Union wrapped up on Tuesday, EU representatives said that they knew of Lukin’s comments and promised to investigate Monday’s actions by the Moscow police.

Michael Webb, the deputy in charge of the EU delegation, said that “on the whole, the European Union supports Russia so that it fulfills the obligations that it undertook as part of the Council of Europe. And also so that it realizes civil rights as secured by the constitution. In particular, the right to free assembly and free speech.”

Russian police detained as many as 170 protesters on Monday evening in Moscow, as more than 1000 opposition activists gathered for the ninth iteration of the Strategy 31 rallies, a series of protests in defense of the constitutional right to the freedom of assembly. Activists and observers present at the rally say that the violence used by the police against protesters was even more brutal than it has been in previous Strategy 31 events, resulting in dozens of injuries and at least two hospitalizations.

Despite repeated appeals by opposition organizers, the Moscow city government refused to sanction the May 31 rally – an ongoing trend that has been criticized by human rights groups and governmental bodies in Russia, Europe, and the United States. Moscow’s Triumfalnaya Square, which the organizers have made their traditional meeting place, had been occupied since earlier in the day by a group of pro-Kremlin youth organizations holding a rally in support of blood drives. Additionally, the entrance to the square from the adjacent metro station had been cordoned off by police.

Such was the scene when Strategy 31 protesters began to arrive for the 6:00 pm rally. According to the Kasparov.ru news site, a young man wearing a shirt indicating that he was involved with the blood drive rally grabbed a poster reading “down with the illegal government” out of the hands of one of the protesters. At that point, the crowd began loudly chanting, and police then began to make detentions.

Eyewitnesses noted that particularly harsh measures were used against participants of the rally. Police dragged protesters, including young women, along the ground and shoved them into buses waiting nearby. They also broke journalists’ cameras and fired pepper spray into the crowd, regardless of the fact that pregnant women and children were present.

Police went about the detentions and general brutality despite the presence of observers from the European Parliament, Russian Human Rights Ombudsman Vladimir Lukin, reappointed by Russian President Dmitri Medvedev in 2009, and Moscow Human Rights Ombudsman Aleksandr Muzykantsky. The police, in fact, attempted to detain Lukin before realizing who he was.

Editor-in-Chief of the New Times magazine, Yevgeniya Albats, was also detained, but was quickly released after she began reporting live from the scene, presumably by cell phone or through other reporters present.

Two of the three Strategy 31 organizers, former Soviet dissident Lyudmila Alexeyeva and writer Eduard Limonov (both of whom have been detained at previous rallies), were surrounded a ring of personal guards and reporters during Monday’s event. The police, however, violently detained the guards for no apparent reason. At the same time, people in the same blood drive rally shirts as the previously mentioned young man attempted to provoke fights with those surrounding the organizers.

Kasparov.ru reports that police detained at least 140 people in all, while Interfax reports the figure as closer to 170. Among those detained were Solidarity bureau member Ilya Yashin, Oborona coordinator Oleg Kozlovsky, Forum.msk news site Editor-in-Chief Anatoly Baranov, Sergei Aksenov of the Other Russia coalition, and Konstantin Kosyakin, the third Strategy 31 organizer. Numerous other journalists were also arrested. Reporting from one of the police buses, Solidarity member Nadezhda Mityushkin said that activists were being severely beaten, Kozlovsky in particular.

The detainees were split up and taken to several different police stations, where the situation for many began to deteriorate. Writing on their microblogs, a number of the detained activists said that OMON riot police held them in hot buses for more than an hour and refused to give them water. An ambulance was eventually called for one Solidarity member who became sick after being kept in one for “several hours.”

The most scandalous case appears to be that of Solidarity activist and Gazeta.ru journalist Aleksandr Artemev, who was hospitalized after police allegedly crushed his shoulder to pieces. The incident allegedly occurred when police ordered detainees off of one of the police buses, before following to violently shoved them back in.

Kasparov.ru reports that doctors have diagnosed Artemev with a comminuted shoulder fracture; as a result, he will have to spend ten days in the hospital.

Artemev noted that he came to the Strategy 31 rally as a civil activist, not as a journalist, and that he did not present his journalist credentials to police upon being detained.

The activist also said that he plans to file suit against the police, and that he has several witnesses as well as video footage of the incident.

Mikhail Mikhailov, editor-in-chief of Gazeta.ru, told Kasparov.ru that the incident was “monstrous.”

“The horror of it is that the police officers used violence against a person who possesses a passport as a citizen of the Russian Federation, and at that did it openly, fearing nothing,” said Mikhailov.

Colonel Aleksandr Khavkin, head of the Zamoskvoreche police station where Artemev was injured, denied that his officers were at fault.

Editor-in-Chief Svetlana Mironyuk of RIA Novosti, who also heads the Public Council of the Moscow City Police, told Gazeta.ru that what happened to Artemev was “outrageous” and promised that the council would invite him to give his side of the story.

Solidarity Executive Director Denis Bilunov said that once inside one of the police stations, the detained activists were held for five hours before being interrogated by men presumed to be Federal Security Service (FSB) officials.

Kasparov.ru reported Tuesday morning that most of the detainees were held by police overnight, and that by this afternoon some had still not been released. The majority are being charged with participating in an unsanctioned event (punishable by up to a 1000 ruble/$32 fine) and resisting a police officer (up to 15 days in detention).

Opposition activists also held a Strategy 31 rally in St. Petersburg. Police detained between 50 and 100 of the 500 gathered on Gostiny Dvor after the crowd began to shout “We need a different Russia” and “Russia will be free.”

Elsewhere in the city, 1500 oppositionists gathered for a “March of Dissent,” also dedicated to defending the constitutional right to free assembly. According to United Civil Front’s St. Petersburg branch leader Olga Kurnosova, OMON riot police initially attempted to block the march before backing down in the face of the insistent protesters.

Yury Shevchuk, leader of the rock band DDT and outspoken Kremlin critic, had asked Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on Saturday whether or not the march would be allowed. The prime minister then responded that it would be allowed if participants acted legally and did not, for example, hold the march near a hospital. The media followed to take his words as an official sanction of the march, although Putin’s press secretary refuted this the next day.

Additionally, in an interview with Gazeta.ru published on Sunday, Shevchuk said that he had received a call from the Russian White House before the meeting and was asked not to pose any “harsh questions of a political character” to the prime minister, because “the prime minister is very tired and you don’t need to irritate and upset him.”

Solidarity bureau member and former Deputy Prime Minister Boris Nemtsov took part in the March of Dissent in St. Petersburg, and commented on the situation in Moscow on his blog:

The situation in Moscow is markedly worse. More than 100 people have been detained, including our colleagues Ilya Yashin and Oleg Kozlovsky. Yashin was holding a Russian flag, Kozlovsky was holding nothing in general. They were held in a scorching hot bus, and are now waiting in the stations. This is a question of the dialogue between Shevchuk and Putin the other day. There are no hospitals on Triumfalnaya Square or Gostiny Dvor, nobody besides the OMON officers themselves blocked traffic. Nobody held banners or used megaphones. Nevertheless, there are more than 100 detainees. A classic example of hypocrisy and lies. Say one thing, think another, do something else.

Of course, having met with Putin, Shevchuk held his March of Dissent spectacularly. And decent people are grateful to him for that. But with Putin, like always – spite, an attempt to deride a distinguished rock musician, and a pathological fear of his own people.

In addition to the events in Moscow and St. Petersburg, several other Strategy 31 rallies were held on Monday all across Russia, including in the cities of Tomsk, Voronezh, Vladivostok, Omsk, and Krasnoyarsk.

A video of the proceedings in Moscow can be seen by clicking here (note: the music that comes on halfway through was from the blood drive rally organizers).

Correction – June 9, 2010:  This story originally reported that the event held by pro-Kremlin youth groups was a blood drive. It was, in fact, a rally in support of the idea of a blood drive; no blood was donated at the event. The article has been corrected to reflect as much.

In a move that was both practical and symbolic, activists had prepared 50 thousand copies of the Russian constitution to hand out to police charged with manning the event. Renowned rights activist Lyudmila Alexeyeva, who was detained in a New Year’s Eve protest despite being 82 years old, had signed each copy with the phrase “in kind remembrance.”

None of the officers present turned down their copy of the document.

A wide variety of opposition movements were represented at Saturday’s rally, and many made speeches chronicling their clashes with police violence and abuse of authority.

“I very much love the police that protect me, but I rarely see them,” said writer Viktor Shenderovich. “More often, I see the cops that beat and murder.” He stressed that the necessity for drastic police reform is a result of Russia lacking free elections, a free press, and free courts.

Referring to Russian President Dmitri Medvedev’s stated goal of wiping out corruption, White Ribbon movement representative Lyubov Polyakova pointed out that whistleblowing officers, such as Aleksei Dymovsky, had been poorly received when responding to the president’s call. “Look what they’ve done to them!” she said. “You don’t want to get rid of corruption; you say that we’re rocking the boat.”

“Yes, we’re rocking your rotten boat, which you, like beetles, have already completely eaten through,” Polyakova concluded.

Major Dymovsky was detained not long after posting two videos on YouTube in November that detail corruption in the Novorossiysk police department.

Sergei Davidis, coordinator of the Union of Solidarity with Political Prisoners, appealed to the officers themselves. Remarking that the rally was calling for rights for the officers, he asked whether they really wanted to work for such paltry salaries and extort bribes to get by, and whether they really, after all, wanted people to hate them.

Solidarity movement member Anastasia Rybachenko stressed the importance of new methods for hiring law enforcement officers. “People who enter the police force intend to get police batons and power,” while others join simply to avoid Russia’s mandatory draft, she said. With the Internal Ministry scraping the bottom of society’s barrel and paying officers next to nothing, it follows that the resulting police force is less than ideal.

Vladimir Lukin, Russia’s federal designate on human rights issues, was noted among those present at the rally.

A resolution taken at the end of the demonstration called for the management of the Internal Ministry to be fired, that political persecution of whistleblowing officers be put to a stop, and that police force not be used in political investigations.

Two groups of counter-protesters attempted to disrupt the rally. Some cast leaflets into the crowd that were printed to look like hundred dollar bills, reading “these dollars are payment for the collapse of the police in Russia.” Members from one group were detained.

While the Russian police have long been notorious for their violent abuse of authority, they came under particularly harsh criticism after Major Denis Yevsyukov killed three and wounded dozens more in a Moscow supermarket while drunk late last April. With the renewed wave of media attention to police abuses that followed, prominent government and public officials began calling for the Internal Ministry to be dissolved. Last December, Russian President Dmitri Medvedev ordered the Ministry to be extensively reformed, and in a January 24 statement said that the number of police personnel “needs to be reduced and wages should be raised.”

In the meantime, scandalous incidents of police brutality show no signs of slowing.

According to Lukin, organizers of the protest, called the March of Dissent, were fully compliant with the law, by informing City Hall of the event 15 days in advance. A response from the mayor’s office, however, came later than required. Lukin added that while the reply offered for organizers to choose a different location, it did not propose an alternate route. In Lukin’s opinion, “this could be appraised as an avoidance of approving a peaceful meeting and demonstration.”

In connection with this, Lukin suggest that organizers of the “March of Dissent” use the legal process to explore the matter. For his part, Lukin promised to “follow the course of the trial closely, and reserve the right to express his point of view regarding the adopted court decisions.”

The March of Dissent was supposed to take place in Moscow on May 6th, but was cancelled by organizers out of fear for the safety of participants. Victor Biryukov, head of the information management and public relations department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, had personally promised United Civil Front director Denis Bilunov that protestors would not be arrested if the march was called off. Still, some 60 demonstrators were arrested as they walked to the planned gathering spot. As result, around 15 people were sentenced to administrative arrests ranging from 3 to 13 days.