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Opposition politicians and activists from more than 50 regions of the country planned to discuss the parliamentary and local elections in September at the first such forum.
After about 40 percent. Police officers stormed the Izmailovo hotel, where it took place, and detained about 150 deputies since the conference began, opposition activist Ilya Yashin said.
The independent group OVD-Info, which monitors the arrests and political repression of opposition members, said that more than 170 participants had been detained.
“The end of the short forum is very symbolic: officers are in police vans and masked policemen are breaking people’s hands,” Yashin wrote on Facebook.
“This is how the Forum of Independent Deputies was arrested,” said Democrats linked to Telegram on social media, posting a video of opponents entering police cars.
The Open Russia movement, backed by prominent Kremlin critic Mikhail Khodorkovsky, previously reported that its detainees included Andrei Pivovarov, its executive director, Yashin, the mayor of Moscow’s Krasnoselsk municipality, and Yulia Galiamina, a deputy for the district municipality. by Timiriazev.
Opposition politician Vladimir Kara-Murza Jr., Russia Open coordinator Tatiana Usmanova and several journalists were also arrested.
The Interior Ministry later announced that officials detained some 200 representatives of public organizations “in violation of sanitary and epidemiological requirements” during an event at a Moscow hotel complex.
“In one of the hotel complexes on the Izmail road, a group of citizens -representatives of public organizations- tried to organize a public event in violation of the established sanitary-epidemiological requirements. A significant proportion of participants did not have personal protective equipment. In addition, members of organizations whose activities were recognized as undesirable on the territory of the Russian Federation were clarified among the participants, ”says the report of the Interior Ministry.
“About 200 people have been handed over to the territorial offices of the Interior Ministry,” the ministry added.
At the time, Pivovarov, who had spoken to AFP by phone while in police custody, said the forum had been detained because authorities believed it was organized by the Open Russia movement, which had been declared an “undesirable organization.”
Mr. Pivovarov added that he had the impression that the authorities were looking for an excuse to end the opposition event.
“Their goal is to intimidate us,” he emphasized.
Comrades of another jailed Kremlin opponent, Alexei Navaln, said the government was seeking to increase pressure on its critics before the September elections.
“It is clear why this forum was dismantled: the government fears any competition during the elections,” read the Telegram message from the Anticorruption Foundation (FBK) created by A. Navaln. The activists also noted that the ruling United Russia party, which diligently supports President Vladimir Putin’s policies, is on the decline in the country.
“Even in a rigged election, it’s getting harder and harder to win,” the message read.
Khodorkovsky’s Open Russia movement was banned in the country in 2017 on the basis of a controversial law against foreign groups accused of political interference.
Entities on the “undesirable” list are prohibited from publishing publications in Russia, and those who cooperate with them may be subject to fines, imprisonment and travel bans in Russia.
Khodorkovsky, a former oligarch and owner of the oil giant Yukos, has been convicted in two controversial cases, seen by many as politically motivated, and spent a decade behind bars. He currently lives abroad.
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