http://www.themoscowtimes.com/stories/2005/02/14/001.html
Monday, February 14, 2005. Issue 3105. Page 1.
Aa Aa Aa
The Red, Orange and Tricolor Rallies
By Francesca Mereu
Staff Writer
Oleg Romanov / AP
More than 40,000 people marching down Tverskaya Ulitsa in a United
Russia-organized show of support for Putin on Saturday.
Pensioners carrying red hammer-and-sickle flags, municipal workers holding
United Russia banners, and young people wearing orange scarves paralyzed
central Moscow on Saturday at rallies and counter-rallies over President
Vladimir Putin and his social reforms.
More than a quarter-million people took to the streets at nationwide rallies
Saturday to demand the resignation of Putin and the government or to show their
support for Putin in the biggest demonstrations yet over a Kremlin-backed law
that replaced state benefits with meager cash allowances as of Jan. 1.
A total of 257,000 people attended 238 rallies in 70 cities, from St.
Petersburg in the northwest to Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk in the Far East, the Interior
Ministry said. Some 21,600 police officers and 3,700 soldiers were on hand to
maintain order.
In the biggest single rally, more than 40,000 people marched down Tverskaya
Ulitsa on Saturday morning in a United Russia-organized rally. It was the first
show of support for Putin and the government after weeks of national protests
against the reforms by tens of thousands of pensioners.
But many of the young and middle-aged participants complained that the rally
was not their idea of how to spend a Saturday morning and said they had been
bussed in from the suburbs. Ekho Moskvy radio said municipal workers were
promised bonuses and students awarded extra credit for showing up, while
soldiers were just ordered to take part.
Marchers carried national flags, United Russia banners and portraits of Putin,
as well as posters reading, "We Are for Stability," "Putin: Create a United
Russia," and "Communists, Stop Making Fools Out of Old People."
The rally -- a clear attempt to raise Putin's popularity ratings, which have
fallen 20 percentage points over the past year -- received broad coverage on
state television. But state television ignored the demonstrations calling for
Putin and the government to resign.
As United Russia held its march near the Kremlin, a crowd of 3,500 mostly
elderly people converged at a Communist Party rally under the towering statue
of Lenin on Kaluzhskaya Ploshchad in southcentral Moscow. Carrying red flags
with the Soviet hammer and sickle, people chanted, "Long live socialist
Russia!" and called on Putin and Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov's Cabinet to
resign. One banner read, "Down with Putin and his criminal entourage."
"Millions of citizens want the government of Fradkov and Putin to resign,"
Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov told the protesters.
On the edge of the crowd, a young police officer heckled a cluster of
protesters from behind a metal barricade. Police detained a Moscow Times
photographer and forced him to delete some photographs he had taken of OMON
police commandos at the rally.
Michael Eckels / MT
A crowd of about 3,500 mostly elderly people carrying red flags at the
Communist rally on Kaluzhskaya Ploshchad on Saturday.
About 200 meters away from the Communist rally, the ultranationalist Liberal
Democratic Party held a counter-rally of about 50 people and offered hot tea
and coffee. "The Communists, who are gathering not very far from our site, have
been promising the same thing for 100 years," party leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky
said, handing out banknotes of 50 rubles to 500 rubles to passersby. "We are a
real party, and we are ready to help people. This is what we are doing today."
On Saturday afternoon, some 700 mainly young people turned up on Pushkin Square
for a rally organized by the liberal Council of Public Solidarity, a group of
nongovernmental organizations and independent trade unions formed last year to
oppose the reform.
Young members of the Young Yabloko party wearing orange scarves and bandannas
also attended the rally. "The orange I'm wearing does not mean that I support
the current Ukrainian leadership, but it is a symbol of freedom and democracy
for me," said Alexei Leontyev, 22. "People achieved what they wanted in
Ukraine, and I want the same for Russia."
Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko recently took office after his country's
Orange Revolution -- weeks of peaceful mass protests over the fraudulent
election of his opponent.
On Pushkin Square, people chanted, "Down with the tsar," and "Freedom for
political prisoners," in a reference to jailed Yukos founder Mikhail
Khodorkovsky. Some waved red flags.
State Duma Deputy Oleg Shein, who heads a small trade union affiliated with the
Council of Public Solidarity, asked for a show of hands in favor of the ouster
of Putin and the government. The motion passed by a comfortable margin.
Shein, a member of the nationalist Rodina party, called for a national
referendum to freeze the implementation of the benefits law until it can be
amended to protect recipients' living standards.
Saturday's rallies came after the Duma on Thursday rejected a no-confidence
motion put forward by Communist and independent deputies. Only 112 deputies in
the 450-seat Duma backed the motion, which needed a simple majority of 226
votes to pass.
Tens of thousands of angry pensioners took to the streets last month in largely
spontaneous protests after losing a range of benefits, including free public
transportation, in return for cash compensation.
In most regions, rattled local authorities have now restored or promised free
or subsidized transportation for pensioners, while the federal government has
rushed to pump several billion dollars into raising pensions and subsidies for
the regions.
Moscow streets were cordoned off by more than 4,000 police officers Saturday,
while extra police officers were posted in metro stations near the rallies.
Many central streets were closed to traffic.
Ivan Sekretarev / AP
Police keeping back protesters who tried to block traffic Saturday in
central Moscow.
In St. Petersburg, about 5,000 people took part in two marches -- one against
the monetization of benefits and the other in support of Putin. Interfax
reported that 2,500 people carrying national flags and United Russia banners
attended the pro-Putin rally. About an equal number of people near a statue of
Lenin called on Putin to resign.
Ekho Moskvy reported that 11 members of the radical National Bolshevik Party
and the new Moving Without Putin movement were detained for attempting to
disrupt the pro-Putin march.
In all, more than 40,000 people in 26 cities took to the streets in northwest
Russia, while more than 80,000 demonstrated in Nizhny Novgorod, Saratov and
other cities in the Volga regions, Itar-Tass reported.
More than 23,000 people participated in protests against the social reforms in
Krasnoyarsk and 23 other cities in Siberia. Over 5,000 people protested in the
Primorye region, while 1,000 people demonstrated on Sakhalin Island.
More than 2,000 people rallied in 13 cities and towns in the Urals, while over
10,000 gathered in 27 cities in the southern regions.
There were no serious clashes between pro- and anti-Putin supporters, the
Interior Ministry said.
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