As our colleague Andrew Kramer reports, organizers said about 26,000 protesters rallied in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square on Monday, on the first anniversary of a protest in the same location that was marred by violence and followed by mass arrests and a police crackdown.
As ever, the protest was extensively documented by the protesters themselves, who, along with journalists, posted images on social networks of the crowd passing slowly through metal detectors at the edge of the square and then filling the space in front of a flatbed truck that served as an improvised stage.
Speakers at the rally called for dozens of protesters charged with disturbing the peace at last year’s demonstration to be cleared. One of those detained last year, Maria Baronova, who was indicted based on a YouTube video of her encouraging protesters, posed for a photograph near the stage on Monday and sang along to a protest tune at the end of the rally.
The protesters were addressed by leading figures in the opposition, including the anti-corruption blogger Aleksei Navalny, who finished a defiant speech by leading the crowd in the chant “Russia Will Be Free!â€
According to a partial translation of his remarks from Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, the American-financed broadcaster, Mr. Navalny made light of what he has called trumped-up charges filed against him for corruption, saying:
One year ago when I was here at the rally, there were zero criminal cases against me. At a rally on September 15, there was one criminal case against me. At a rally on December 15, there were four criminal cases against me. Now there are either four or six criminal cases against me. I lost count myself. And I don’t give a damn! There may be 124 criminal cases and I will go on saying what I want and I will speak my mind. And I think that you do not want to hear anything from me but truth.
Julia Ioffe, a former Moscow correspondent for The New Yorker, who wrote a profile of Mr. Navalny in 2010, noted that he also said, “I don’t have another country or another family or another people except you.â€
Another opposition leader, Ilya Yashin, pointed out that one of the demonstrators proudly wearing a button with the slogan “The Case Against Navalny Is the Case Against Me!†was the activist’s brother. In his case, the words were more than just metaphorical, since he has been named as a co-defendant in one of the cases filed against his brother.
A Russian-language video report on the rally from the independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta, showed the buttons being handed out at the rally location, where posters dedicated to protesters detained last year were also erected.
Robert Mackey also remixes the news on Twitter @robertmackey.
Ilya Mouzykantskii is a freelance journalist and a New York Times intern in Moscow. Follow him on Twitter @ilyamuz.
