The “midday anti-Putin” protests, in which voters lined up outside polling stations in major cities such as Moscow, St. Petersburg, Yekaterinburg, Chelyabinsk, Tomsk and Novosibirsk, were planned to counter Kremlin policies. , was an impressive, if futile, display of solidarity and dissent. The main message is that Putin is a legitimate president with massive support.
Many polling stations in Moscow were deathly quiet on Sunday morning, but authorities sent out a flurry of text messages warning against taking part in “extremist” actions, the latest in a harsh crackdown on dissent since the invasion of Ukraine. Despite this, hundreds of arrests were made in 2022, when long lines formed just after 12 p.m.
Mr Navalny, who has long campaigned for free and fair elections in Russia, was prevented from running in the 2018 presidential election and called on Russians to vote against President Putin at noon on Sunday. was. This was Navalny's last political act before his death. His widow, Yulia Navalnaya, has accused Putin of ordering the killing, and many Western leaders have said he is responsible. The Kremlin denies the allegations.
Many voters also posted photos of defaced ballots with protest slogans such as “Navalny is my president,” “No to war, no to Putin” and “Putin is a murderer.”
Voting took place over three days starting Friday, which some critics said raised the possibility of ballot manipulation or other fraud. Voting was also taking place in Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine, where there were reports that election teams accompanied by soldiers forced people to vote at gunpoint. Voters in 27 regions of Russia and two regions of occupied Ukraine also have access to widely criticized opaque online voting systems, with no means to verify votes or prevent tampering.
But three days of voting gave voters ample opportunity to visit polling stations at their own times, making it clearer that the sudden crowds at midday on Sunday did not materialize by chance.
In addition to Putin, three other candidates were on the ballot, all essentially pro-Kremlin and lower-profile figures who aimed to create a semblance of legitimacy without posing a serious threat. It was a highly controlled election. Two anti-war candidates who could be a flashpoint for anti-war sentiment, Boris Nadezhdin and Ekaterina Duntsova, were banned from running.
By 12:30 p.m., a line of dozens of people, mostly Muscovites in their 20s and 30s, had stretched around a city block at one polling station next to Polyanka metro station in central Moscow. A police van and two patrol cars were waiting nearby, and the entrance to the polling place was guarded by several police officers and security guards.
“We came here to vote against President Putin,” said Elizaveta, 21. “We're going to put three crosses to show that we support everyone but Putin.” Literally everyone else is better than him. ”
The Washington Post is not fully revealing the identities of her and other voters interviewed for this article due to the risk of serious repercussions, including criminal prosecution by Russian authorities.
Elizaveta's mother Marina added: “Elizabeta has been in the same place for too long.”
The “midday anti-Putin” demonstrations are the third recent sign of large-scale protests and political opposition in Russia through long lines.
In January, citizens formed long lines to sign petitions needed to secure anti-war candidate Nadezhdin's place on the ballot. Afterwards, the authorities banned him from entering the country due to fraudulent signatures.
Thousands of people formed a huge procession to attend Navalny's funeral this month, and spent several days afterwards laying flowers and leaving letters at his grave.
The protests have been largely symbolic in Russia's climate of political fear, with authorities expected to maintain tight control over the coming months amid a war that has cost Russia dearly.
Still, the signs of public anger are unmistakable. Rather than waiting for Sunday's protests, some disgruntled Russians responded with anger as soon as voting began on Friday, setting fire to polling stations and ballots, or dumping liquid into ballot boxes. Some people expressed that.
The “Noonday Anti-Putin” protests not only denounce an election widely denounced as neither free nor fair, but also the divided and often demoralized critics of Putin and the war, many of whom are now living in exile. The purpose is to express support for
Navalny's team narrated the day of the protest live and streamed it on Navalny's YouTube channel. One of the anchors was Leonid Volkov, Navalny's longtime top political adviser, who was recently attacked with a hammer by an assailant outside his home in Vilnius, Lithuania. Volkov appeared on the air with his arm in a sling.
Two friends, Alina, 17, and Marina, 19, arrived at the Polianka polling station together, intending to vote against Putin.
Alina said the protests gave her hope that “a civilized and democratic Russia is possible.”
“We came here so we wouldn't feel alone,” Arena said. “There are very few opportunities to do this anymore, so I wanted to take my stand in a safe and legal way.” She added, “I consider this action successful because it gives people strength and power.” People will at least see the line and hear about it, and it means something.”
“We wanted to peacefully protest against the current power and show that we do not and will not support it,” Marina said.
Nikolai, 28, who was also at the polling station, said he was surprised by the high turnout, but some other demonstrators said they had expected a larger crowd. .
“I came here today to express my position and to do my part to show that there is still political activity and different opinions in this country,” Nikolai said. Told. “It’s important to show people that they are not alone and that there is still support for this kind of behavior.”
It is difficult to carry out any form of protest in wartime Russia. Authorities are quick to disperse even small street gatherings and brutally crack down on activists and opposition groups. Citizens were arrested for placing flowers at Navalny's monument, and others were detained for standing alone holding a blank piece of paper.
One of the regime's main instruments of control, Russian courts impose long prison sentences on citizens for trivial acts such as reposting social media or substituting information about the war on supermarket price tags. .
The “Noonday Anti-Putin” protests were particularly visible at Russian embassies in countries with large populations of Russians who fled after the invasion of Ukraine. These included Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Germany, China, Portugal, and the United Kingdom.
It was impossible to estimate how many people took part in Russia and around the world, but photos and videos showed lines of hundreds of people at many polling stations.
Navalnaya and other prominent opposition leaders showed up at a protest outside the embassy in Berlin, where hundreds of people waited in line for more than an hour to vote.
“People in the Kremlin do not understand how absurd and stupid they look,” former Yukos oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who was imprisoned in Russia for 10 years and is currently in exile, told a crowd in Berlin. Ta. “We who oppose President Putin are not aliens, but the majority. Freedom for Ukraine! Freedom for Russia!”
In between speeches, people chanted “Russia without Putin,” and some members of the Russian opposition held a concert in front of the embassy.
Stanislav Andreyshuk, co-chairman of the independent election monitoring agency Golos, who has been labeled a foreign agent by Russian authorities, said there have been numerous reports of apparent ballot stuffing, with bundles of ballots stuffed into official boxes. Stated. He said there were also signs of irregularities in the voting dates announced by the Central Election Commission.
By mid-afternoon Sunday, Golos had mapped more than 1,400 reports of potential election fraud. The group's co-chairman, Grigory Melkonyants, is in custody awaiting trial.
In one report to Mr. Golos, a state official in Chechnya, southern Russia, complained that he was repeatedly bused from his polling station and from other polling stations to vote. The employee said he voted seven times in the first two days.
Since seizing power on December 31, 1999, President Putin has steadily undermined Russia's nascent democracy, suppressed rights and suppressed dissent. His main political opponents have been imprisoned, killed or exiled, while protesters risk long prison terms for criticizing the war and Putin. ing.
Since replacing Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev in 2008 while retaining the country's highest political power, Putin has repeatedly found ways to bypass term limits to stay in power. Four years later they exchanged again. In 2020, President Putin engineered constitutional changes that would allow him to remain in power until 2036. President Putin, who claims victory this weekend, is in office until 2030.
Unlike Ukraine, where five presidents were elected under Putin, there are no democratic options in Russian elections. Critics claim the Kremlin is blocking genuine opposition candidates from voting, controlling media coverage and falsifying results.
Independent Russian media outlets, including Dozhihad TV, which was shut down by Russian authorities and now broadcast from Amsterdam, described this week's vote as a “so-called election.”
According to numerous reports in independent Russian-language media, including journalist Farida Rustamova's Telegram channel Faridaily, most civil servants and employees of state-owned enterprises were ordered by their bosses to vote on Friday, and on Sunday. Voting was strongly discouraged. She said she has received hundreds of reports from state officials.
In Russia's tightly controlled society, just seeing fellow protesters join in the anti-Putin midday rally is empowering, Alina said.
“I love the atmosphere here,” she said. Maybe today I'll make new friends with people who think like me. ”
Her friend Marina echoed that optimism, but said she was also realistic about some glimmers of hope for change.
“I think today's protest was a success in that it gave people a little bit of energy. It supports people mentally,” she said. “But of course that doesn’t affect the authorities.”
Dixon reported from Riga, Latvia. Mary Ilyushina in Berlin and Natalia Abakumova in Riga contributed to this report.