THOUSANDS of protesters have filled a Moscow square to denounce President Vladimir Putin a year into his new term and rekindle the momentum that was brutally quashed when a protest last year led to mass arrests.
Thousands of protesters have filled a Moscow square to denounce Vladimir Putin’s rule. AAP
Organisers said tens of thousands turned up for the rally, which marked one year since a chaotic anti-Kremlin protest on May 6, 2012, that descended into violence.
Police estimated the numbers on Monday at 8,000.
“Putin is a thief,” charismatic opposition figurehead Alexei Navalny said to cheers from the crowds. “We will throw him out of the Kremlin.”
The long-awaited protest was, however, clouded by the death of a worker who was crushed by a massive loudspeaker as he was helping to erect the stage for the event.
Navalny, who is standing trial on what he says are trumped-up charges, made a long-awaited appearance at the rally on a blustery spring evening, delivering a campaign-style stump speech.
“Together with you I am not afraid of anything,” the blue-eyed 36-year-old said, his wife Yulia standing next to him in a conjugal appearance reminiscent of a US presidential candidate.
“I will never surrender and I will never go away. I am fighting for a new future for my family, for my children and so are you,” he said.
More than two dozen people now face jail over their involvement in last year’s rally in a criminal probe activists have condemned as a throwback to the Stalin era.
One activist has already been jailed for four and a half years for purportedly resorting to violence in the 2012 rally. Another has been sentenced for two and a half years.
A leading opposition journalist sang from the stage, a famous actor read out a poem and one of Russia’s most loved actresses, Liya Akhedzhakova, read a letter from one of the jailed activists.
“The whole square is full. There are tens of thousands of us,” said former government member turned Putin critic Boris Nemtsov, clutching a bunch of white roses.
Unlike last year’s dramatic protest, Monday’s event was peaceful.
Flowers were laid by a railing in memory of the dead worker while a minute of silence was held in his honour before the event got under way.
A van from the Investigative Committee was conspicuously parked right behind the stage as the probe into the worker’s death continued.
He was not an opposition activist but the employee of a firm contracted to prepare the stage, organisers said.
