Massive pro-Alexei Navalny protests challenge Vladimir Putin across Russia: hundreds detained

More than a hundred people have been arrested in various Russian cities during protests taking place on Wednesday in support of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, whose health deteriorated in prison.

According to the portal OVD-Info, specialized in monitoring arrests and defending detainees, they have so far been arrested 113 people in 39 cities.

Most of the arrests (19) took place in the Siberian city of Kemerovo, where the protest is already over.

In other Siberian cities like Irkutsk and Tomsk, where, due to the time difference with Moscow, the protests also ended, there was about a ten inmates.

At the same time, in Novosibirsk, one of the main towns in the region and where some 4000 people, according to portal calculations Taiga.info, the demonstration took place peacefully without any reports of arrests.

Between 1,500 and 2,000 people were also concentrated in the Siberian Omsk, with cries of “Freedom to Alexéi Navalny” Yes “Go out with the Tsar”, without police intervention or incidents.

At Moscow and St. Petersburg the protests were called at 7:00 p.m. local time (4:00 p.m. GMT).

The Russian police arrested this Wednesday a few hours before the start of the demonstrations at Navalni “number two”, Liubov Sóbol, and his spokesperson, Kira yarmish.

At Saint Petersburg, Ekaterinburg and Krasnoyarsk law enforcement officers are searches of homes and premises for local coordinators of Navalny offices, volunteers and journalists, according to opposition media.

The Interior Ministry and the prosecution had already warned a few days before that they would take “measures” this Wednesday if the unauthorized demonstration takes place.

Protests in favor of the opposition leader in mid-January, on his return from Germany after months of treatment for a poisoning with a chemical agent, they ended up with over 10,000 inmates across the country.

(With information from EFE)

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