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Police officers take away a person in St. Petersburg
Photo: - / AFP
Thousands of people have again demonstrated in dozens of places in Russia against the partial mobilization for the war of aggression against Ukraine - civil rights activists are among them
according to
more than 700 people have been arrested.
The human rights portal ovd.info reported in the evening of 747 arrests in a total of 32 cities across the country.
It is only about the men and women who are known by name, ovd.info said there could be many more people in custody.
Some of those arrested are said to be minors.
According to the portal, there were at least 380 arrests in the Russian capital Moscow alone – 125 in St. Petersburg.
The anti-war protests had been banned by the authorities, and the Russian police took brutal action against participants in the demonstrations.
Videos were released on social networks from St. Petersburg showing men in combat uniform and helmets beating demonstrators.
The portal ovd.info, citing eyewitnesses, reported that the security forces also used stun guns.
Arbitrarily taken away passers-by
The Moscow police also cracked down on the demonstrators.
According to SPIEGEL observations, the police officers arbitrarily led passers-by away from the square in front of the Chistye Prudy metro station who had nothing to do with the protests.
Special police officers patrolled the nearby parking lot, and there were also repeated checks in the metro station.
A young woman in a wheelchair held up a placard for a few seconds that read: "Do you want to be like me?" Then dozens of special police officers came, one grabbed the placard from her, the rest pushed the journalists away.
However, unlike many other people, the woman was not arrested.
Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin wants to draft in around 300,000 reservists to hold the areas still occupied in Ukraine after the Russian army was defeated.
This had already triggered protests in about 40 cities last week.
More than 1300 people were arrested.
On Wednesday, seven months after invading Ukraine, Putin ordered a partial mobilization of his army.
Meanwhile, apparently more than 200 men who were arrested during the protests against the partial mobilization in Moscow on Wednesday received their draft papers directly.
This was spread by the editor-in-chief of the Russian propaganda channel RT (formerly »Russia Today«), Margarita Simonian, via Twitter.
Authorities confirm queues of cars at the border with Georgia
The partial mobilization had triggered anger and panic among many Russians.
At the border crossings, long queues formed with vehicles waiting to leave the country.
A Russian authority confirmed this for the first time on Saturday: "There is a significant influx of private vehicles," said the Interior Ministry of the Russian border region of North Ossetia.
Accordingly, "around 2,300" vehicles were waiting to pass a border crossing.
The ministry called on people to refrain from traveling to Georgia.
The search query “leave Russia” was searched 100 times more often on the morning the partial mobilization was announced, according to data from Google Trends.
Most direct flights to countries with no visa requirements for Russians are now sold out and prices have risen enormously.
There was also increased traffic on the borders with Kazakhstan and Mongolia.
Witnesses reported hours of waiting at the border crossings.
kko/heb/dpa