San Antonio Express-News (Sunday)
Protest in eastern Russia intensifies
MOSCOW — Ignoring pleas from the Kremlin for calm after more than a week of unrest, protesters in the Russian Far East on Saturday staged their biggest display of defiance yet, with tens of thousands of people pouring into the streets to protest the arrest of a popular regional governor.
Russian news media reported that 50,000 or more people had joined a rally in the capital of Khabarovsk Krai, a sprawling territory nearly 4,000 miles east of Moscow. Thousands more attended protests in other regional towns and in Vladivostok, a port city on the Pacific Ocean in neighboring Primorsky Krai.
The government in Khabarovsk, the regional capital, said in a statement that only 10,000 people had gathered “at the beginning” but gave no figure for the overall turnout. Police officers in Khabarovsk made no effort to stop what authorities described as an “illegal” but peaceful protest and instead handed out face masks. In Vladivostok, however, a number of arrests were reported.
The protests began after the arrest July 9 on murder charges of Khabarovsk’s governor, Sergei Furgal, one of a handful of regional leaders not affiliated with a party entirely controlled by the Kremlin.
Instead of being held in Khabarovsk, where authorities allege the crimes took place, Furgal was flown to Moscow immediately after his arrest, a move seen by many locals as an unwarranted intrusion into their affairs and an effort by the Kremlin to grab control of the case.
The case longstanding has crystallized resentments in
Russia’s far-flung regions toward Moscow, which is often seen as demanding loyalty while giving little in return.
Furgal is a member of the Liberal Democratic Party, a farright outfit that has grown increasingly restive over its Kremlin-assigned role as a decorative and largely powerless “opposition” party in Russia’s tightly controlled political system.