Oksana Chelysheva On March Arrests

(the below is the body of an email I was forwarded. There's already a PDF of it here .)

Today, on 25 November (2007?), Police in St Petersburg detained leading opposition activists Olga Kurnosova, Nikita Belykh, Maksim Reznik, Leonid Gozman, and Andrey Dmitriev when they were leaving the local offices of the liberal opposition party, Yabloko. According to Marina Litvinovich, Gozman and Reznik as well as Alexander Shurshev, member of Yabloko's youth wing, were beaten up by the police.

Natalya Shavshukova, deputy chair of Union of Rightist Forces (SPS in St Petersburg, was detained earlier when she was taking pictures of United Russia party fliers in the underground. Ms Shavshukova is a candidate in the elections to the State Duma. Nikolay Andrushenko, 60, journalist at the local newspaper, New Saint Petersburg, was taken into custody yesterday for two months for his article "Why I am joining the March of Dissent".

Marina Litvinovich, the chair of the Foundation to Support Victims of Terror and Kasparov's adviser, told on phone that Nemtsov was detained just during our conversation (at around 13.30). She told that she had been detained too but managed to persuade an OMON serviceman on the bus that she was a passer-by going to the Hermitage. She has escaped.

When I reached Andrey Dmitriev on phone he told that he together with one more person was being kept in the criminal police office of the Tsentralnyy district. He was detained long before the March started. Their passports have been taken away. They are being showed photos of different assaults at foreigners committed in Piter and asked whether they know anything about these crimes. He told that the police is doing it just for the sake of appearance. They tell that both of them will be let go after 3 pm. He was really released at 14.45 without any charges.

Right now there is another rally going on in Dvortsovaya Square. It is pro-Putin. He is likely to be there.

The OMON is really violent. Marina tells that many people have been injured and some 200 detained. There is information that the OMON is taking many of the detained people outside the city where they let them go (it was exactly the same scenario in Nazran, according to the information from Ingushetia).

I have just talked to Evgeniy Pavlenko, also an Other Russia activist in Piter. Marina's phone is not responding.

He told that the OMON became absolutely violent when the marching column of up to 2000 people was trying to get to Dvortsovaya Square. The OMON blocked Senatskaya square and people were going along the embankment when the OMON attacked them.

He tells that it was really scary. Even passer-byes were beaten up. Many people jumped onto the driving lanes in order to escape police batons. Some people jumped over the embankment barrier, almost onto the ice of the river (as he describes). He saw many people being beaten up. He has managed to run away.

He tells that Alexander Shurshev (the Young Yabloko) who was severely beaten up was taken to Mariinskiy Hospital.

The day before Marches, rallies and pickets in support of the Other Russia were held in Moscow, Nizhny Novgorod, Orenburg, Kazan, Astrakhan, Pskov and a lot of other cities.

In Nizhny Novgorod the March of the Dissent was to start at 12 on Saturday, November 24. All the attempts to find consensus with the authorities failed. The administration of Nizhny Novgorod refused to authorize holding a rally in Gorky Square under the pretext that "it is not meant for holding public actions". The March was initiated by several people affiliated with the Other Russia. The Foundation to Support Tolerance was not among organizers this time...

People started to get together in the area of Gorky Square at around 11.40. The Square had been cordoned off with the military troops at the Ministry of the Interior. Soldiers manned the square along its perimeter. The OMON forces were concentrated in the yards and they blocked most of the adjacent streets. Some 20 policemen were at the entrance to the Central Post Office. There were some ten police buses full with the policemen and six cars of road police behind the building. There were three buses with the police force at the building of Mac Donald's. People tell that a suspiciously looking groups of youngsters were seen behind Mac Donald's and at the Europe food store. In Zvezdinka Street people saw six buses with the police force. There were slogans "From Governor to residents of Nizhny Novgorod" on all of them. According to rough estimates, number of policemen and military amounted to a thousand...

At around 11.40 one of the organizers of the March, Ilya Shamazov, was detained when he was leaving the building of the city administration and brought to the Nizhegorodskiy district prosecutor's office. Then he was moved to the UBOP where they interrogated him on counterfiet software. Not a single question about the March but many nasty comments on Stas Dmitrievskiy (it means that it doesn't matter whether Stas is outspoken or keeps quiet: the level of hatred is the same).

The police started to detain people on the way to Gorky Square. Elena Evdokimova called from the Sovetskiy district police station and told that she had been taken there from her flat for a conversation. She was brought to the chief of the police station. Although she was not detained, the police didn't let her leave the premises of the police station.

At around 12.15 the police started to detain people who were standing in a group near Mac Donald's. When detentions began, people started to shout "Russia without Putin" (Vladimir Putin). Six of them were taken to Nizhegorodskiy police office, including Stas Dmitriesvkiy. They tell that they were beaten up on the way there on the police bus. The police prohibit them to use cell phones. After that, people kept coming to Mac Donald's and the group was growing. There were up to a hundred people in it. People in Nizhny tell that it is difficult to tell how many people were going to participate in the March, many were detained on the way to the venue. They received many phone calls from towns in the region like Arzamas, Balakhna, Dzerzhink, Kstovo, Zavolzhye where people were going to come to Nizhny Novgorod. Information about people being taken off trains is not available.

At around 12.50 another group of up to 100 people raised the banner of the Other Russia and started to shout "We want Other Russia", "Russia without Putin". The police attacked them and detained some twenty of them. The detained people were being taken to Sovetskiy district police station.

At around 1 pm, six more people were detained at Mac Donalds although they were just standing there without any slogans.

The authorties are accusing all the detained in Nizhny in participating in unauthorized rally and offering resistance to the police. However, there are witnesses from among REN-TV journalists who have agreed to testify that no resistance was offered and present their video footage to prove it. Dmitrievskiy also turned to a prosecutor's office as he was beaten together with the other detained people on the bus. Late in the evening Stas was found 'guilty" of offering resistance to the police and given a 1000-ruble fine. It didn't even help that the REN TV journalists brought their video footage proving that the group was standing quiet at the Mac Donald's when the OMON attacked them. It was at the time when the people who were being detained started screaming "Russia without Putin" while they were being dragged to the buses. And only after people had been detained, a blondie from the procuracy read out their warning...

After a court session Stas went to the forensic medicine office but they refused to carry it (medical examination?) although he had a paper from the procuracy. But the reason was natural as it was the office responsible only for autopsy... The investigator misdirected him. Shockingly mocking, I should say.

In Moscow after the rally finished almost all people who made speeches were detained, including Kasparov and the leader of For Human Rights movement Lev Ponomaryov. They were beaten. Kasparov was taken to the police station of Moscow Basmanny district and his lawyer Olga Mikhaylova was denied access to him. Later he was brought to Meschanskiy district court and the judge sentenced him for five days in custody for "organizing an unauthorized rally and numerous refusals to obey orders to stop given by an OMON fighter Utushkin". Limonov's whereabouts were not established for some hours although the police confirmed his detention. As for the others, court sessions have been postponed until November 26.

In Ingushetia yesterday night unidentified armed people (supposedly guards of the Ingush president) disappeared (sic! she probably meant "kidnapped" - TY) Oleg Orlov, of the Memorial human rights center, and three journalists of the REN-TV channel. They were taken away from the Assa hotel, brought to some field and threatened with execution. After that the abductors left. Orlov and journalists got to the nearest settlement which was Nesterovskaya settlement. According to Orlov, his injuries were minor. The journalists' condition is much worse.

The rally in Nazran against arbitrariness against civilians was violently crashed today. The OMON opened fire. There are wounded people from among protesters. They were trying to defend themselves by throwing eggs and tomatoes at the OMON.

Some sixty people have been detained, according to the Ingushetia.ru webpage. The webpage has been hacked. The Ingush TV links the rally in Nazran with the Other Russia and claims that the protesters got 1000000 rubles from Moscow to hold it. The Ingush prosecutor Yury Turygin is again lying in his comments on the rally. He claimed that there were some 30 participants and only seven people were detained.

There has been a series of detentions all over Russia, including putting people under enforced psychiatric treatment. It happened in Joshkar Ola yesterday. Artyom Basyrov was stopped on a street and taken to hospital where a consilium of doctors decided to put him under enforced treatment. One of the Other Russia activists in Serpukhov, Moscow Region, was beaten up by unidentified people the day before the March. His situation is grave as he suffered a serious craniocerebral injury. He is still in coma.

Best regards,

Oksana Chelysheva