Russia tariff protest widens into broad discontent!
VLADIVOSTOK, Russia - December 21,
2008 - Riot police clubbed, kicked and detained dozens in the Pacific port of
Vladivostok on Sunday in a harsh crackdown on a protest that was one of dozens
across Russia by people outraged over an increase in car import tariffs.
With unemployment spiking, prices rising and the ruble sliding, the protests over a seemingly mundane tariff appear to be broadening into a wide expression of public discontent - and beginning to present a genuine challenge to the Kremlin.
"The Russian people have started to open their eyes to what's happening in this country," said Andrei Ivanov, a 30-year-old manager who joined about 200 people at a rally in Moscow. "The current regime is not acting on behalf of the welfare of the people, but against the welfare of the people."
Hundreds rallied in the city Saturday for the second weekend in a row, and demonstrators hoped to rally again Sunday. But authorities refused to authorize the demonstration and hundreds of riot police blocked off the city square where it was planned.
Soon after, several hundred people gathered on Vladivostok's main square - not the planned site of the demonstration. Waiting riot police ordered them to disperse, saying the gathering was illegal. The group refused and began singing and dancing around a traditional Russian New Year's tree on the square.
Police - some shipped in from Moscow, 9,300 kilometers (5,750 miles) to the west - began hauling men and women into waiting vans as people chanted "Fascists!" and "Shame! Shame!"
Vladimir Litvinov, who heads a local rights group, said police behaved "like beasts" and had no right to break up the gathering, since it wasn't overtly political.
"We support a civilized resolution to all the problems but when they send Moscow riot police to break up a gathering in our city, and they start breaking arms and legs and heads...," he told AP. "People are very, very angry. It's hard to predict what might happen now."
