Moscow April 22, 2013
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4.2.2 Resources Involved. Distribution of Security ForcesAccording to various information, official and informal, on May 6, 2012 more than 12,800 officers of the Ministry of Internal Affairs were located in the centre of Moscow, including 8,094 officers in GIBDD area of Bolotnaya Square. They included: police, including OMON – 5,334 persons, GIBDD policemen – 100 persons, interior troops (military unit No. 3641, military unit No. 3500) – 2400 persons, students of the Ministry of Internal Affairs – 200 persons. A considerable number of technical equipment units, including street cleaning machines were involved. They were used as anti-crossing barriers on Bolshoy Kammeny Bridge and Bolshoy Moskvoertskiy Bridge, as well as at the lanes adjacent to Bolshaya Yakimanka Street. Besides the Moscow police forces and OMON, considerable forces from the Moscow region (Sofrino, Balashikha), St. Petersburg, Ivanovo, Mari-El, Chelyabinsk and even Yakutsk were involved. Preventive operations were carried out with the regional activists in order to minimize the participation of regional activists: Participant’s evidence (hereinafter referred to as PE) No. 314 “Some facts, such as private talks to the assumed march participants, dissuasion to go, punctured tires, detained cars, give evidence of the forecast confrontation; Lipetsk police forces feared that Lipetsk oppositionists will be noticed and did their best [to prevent this]”. Many participants from other towns were not able to reach Moscow because of counteraction of the local law-enforcement authorities. For example, many activist from Nizhniy Novgorod were detained at the Nizhniy Novgorod railway station; rather unusual measures were taken to prevent the participants from regions. PE No. 310 “I came from Ryazan by the Voronezh-Moscow through-passing train. By some reason on that date the daily Ryazan-Moscow express train, departing at noon (don’t remember the exact time) and arriving at 4 PM was cancelled. No such cancellations come to my mind. Although I haven’t been to Moscow for many times for the recent six years, when I did, I always took the express train because of the constant schedule.” PE No. 312 “I got from Tula hitchhiking. Our bus was stopped by the police officers, so only me and my friend were able to arrive”. The measures taken were of not only unusual but rather often of an almost criminal character: PE No. 315 “it seemed strange to find punctured tires of my two cars (Lipetsk), the my car was detained (by the reason of alleged registration plate change)”. Such misadventures were voiced from the meeting platform by E. Domozhirov from Vologda. Regardless of the common practice, the meeting organizers also met difficulties, particularly in equipment transportation,
and generally in passage to the planned and approved meeting area: PE No. 491 (I. Bakirov) “Before the meeting, the stage was in accessible from any place, even wearing the “Organizer” badge”. And regardless of the common practice of the organizers’ cooperation with police representatives and city authorities, in practice there were no possibility to contact them or find them on the Square”. The distribution of the security forces along the approved meeting area is a serious matter for consideration of the actions planned by the authorities: if police and OMON cordons on the bridges across the Moskva river and in the very centre PE No. 450 (E. Krasnova) “As we were taken away [in prison trucks]… we saw the Kremlin surrounded by military forces. There were hundreds of trucks and hundreds of people in uniform” can be explained by the decision not to let the participants to the central squares of the Capital (the Manezhnaya Square, the Revolution Square, the Red Square), the distribution of considerable forces at Zamoskvorechie district, repeatedly reported by the participants, cannot be explained without the assumption of an attempt to block forcefully the participants on all sides, planned beforehand: PE No. 397 “Step-by-ste,p they blocked the lanes entrances. All these streets were full of PAZ buses and URAL trucks and even street cleaning machines. Police and military troops are moving along Yakimanka Street, they bring metallic barriers and instruct personnel”; PE No. 277 “I tried to get to Yakimanka Street by lanes, but all passages were blocked. There were OMON buses in every lane, and the passages were blocked with metallic barriers (even within the stated boundaries). The OMON representatives were [fully equipped] and I understood that there was a plan of force action at the demonstration”. A special attention must be given to the unprecedented number of police officers with dogs: PE No. 351 “I noticed police officers got out of police buses with dogs approximately in the middle of the way to Maly Kamenny Bridge. I made photos of that”; PE No. 336 “The Bolotnaya Square public garden was also surrounded with military working dogs”; PE No. 310 “There was no reason for second barriers placement not far from the stage. The public garden was full of OMON with dogs”; PE No. 159 “Alongside the fence [of the Bolotnaya Square garden] there were OMON agents in helmets. When we stayed near the fountain for a while to recover breath, we saw the regiments forming. They shouted “Troop! Line up!” They were ready for violence against the demonstrators. Waiting for the signal, talking on the phone and reporting the regiment was ready. There were several regiments there. But the most fearful were women with shepherds along the perimeter. I counted them. They were 15. Nobody saw them except us. Suddenly the signal came and the regiments moved towards the demonstrators. They were followed by the women with shepherds. Our hearts sank. What if they attack people! But fortunately they stopped”. There is no reason for the large number of working dogs in the area of the approved public assembly; moreover, the dogs constitute a real threat to the security of the citizens. Besides, the service vehicles of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation arrived at Bolotnaya Square. This information is stated in the V.P. Lukin’s, the Human Rights Commissioner, report.
4.2.3 Meeting of the demonstration participants in the area of the Kaluzhskaya Square3 PM Participants began to pass through 12 metal detection arches (PE No. 304) at about 3 PM. The participants’ evidence include various opinions on the passing through arrangements. Nearly 45% consider the passing through was normal. PE No. 27 “There was ordinary inspection, rather slow, we had been waiting for our turn for about 15-20 minutes. They checked bags, let people through the arches, and then inspected people with hand-held metal detectors.” 31% of participants assure the examination was stricter than usual. That caused accumulation of people near the arches. Some of them had to wait for more than an hour to pass to Yakimanka Street. People were forced to open bags, turn out pockets, leave water in plastic bottles, even 0.33 ml, some had to leave their umbrellas. Some people also were searched personally by the police officers: PE No. 209 “I was searched by a female police officer”; PE No. 189 “The police officers touched my body with her hands”; PE No. 183 “We had literally all our pockets felt, all bags and parcels turned out”; PE No. 23 “It was rather tough examination, I was forced to turn my rucksack, inside out, the water was taken away, I was forced to open a pack of sanitary pads”; PE No. 304 “The examination was carried more thoroughly than usual and caused a crush near the metal detection arches. Those who came chanted “Let us through!” and “Shame on you!” Two people were detained for an attempt to carry a tent to the meeting area. The demonstration along Bolshaya Yakimanka Street began at a later time because of slow work of the police officers who conducted the examination at the assembly entrance”; PE No. 464 “I was waiting for about an hour to pass through the arches. There were few arches and people were still coming. All people were made to have their bags searched and men and guys were examined thoroughly. Even the smallest bottles were taken away, people were forced to throw open bottles to boxes”; PE No. 462 “Police officers examined everybody for a long time and rather thoroughly”; PE No. 465 “the examination was carried out thoroughly”. 23% of the participants reported that the examination was rather weak or even was not carried at all: PE No. 16 “My acquaintance said that in some places there people passed freely on the left from the metal detection arches and even could pass through without examination. So did my acquaintances – bypassing the arches and the examination”; PE No. 35 “Despite the large number of arches at the entrance, the pass through was carried out badly. The bags were searched haphazardly, people were asked to open them but police officers examined them unwillingly. So it was possible to sneak anything”; PE No. 71 “I was among the first persons to pass the arches, right after the journalists. There was a crash, that’s why nobody examined me thoroughly, I think. I had a plastic bottle of steel water in my rucksack, but nobody prohibited me to carry it through”; PE No. 80 “The examination was surprisingly rapid, in contrast to the previous meetings. We were asked to pass quickly, not to stay for too long and, in my opinion, the examination was not careful enough”. Some reports of the participants differ from these three groups of opinions about the pass through arrangement. So a group of athletic young people, wearing black T-shirts and jeans with ski masks on their faces were let in without any examination under the order of a policeman: PE No. 300 “When I was passing through, a group of young people, first year students probably, came wearing ski masks, black T-shirts and jeans. Their appearance was not familiar to me. I was surprised that the policeman, who made me pass through the arches ordered other policemen not to examine them and let them in”. There are stories about a small group of young people with plywood figures of people with the inscriptions “paper protester”. They behaved aggressively and provoked others. The participants tried to attract the police’s attention to this group, but the police intentionally didn’t pay any attention to them. Then the participants tried to establish order by themselves: PE No. 111 “We began to shame them, but the guys kept silence and covered themselves with their plywood figures, then people began to throw small change to them, finally people around took their figures and broke them; the guys scattered”; PE No. 284 “There were several young people to the right of the arches, on the left side of Yakimanka Street. They carried large people figures of plywood (with the following inscriptions: “this is our million”, “this man is needed to make a million”). The participants were outraged and threw small change to the provokers, then broke the plywood figures. The police did not take any measures, though they had to remove provokers to prevent conflicts. A group of teenagers (they had their faces covered with hoods) traversed the column snarling for some reason”; PE No. 320 “Before the demonstration (as far as I remember it was even in front of the metal detection arches), I noticed a group of people, carrying plywood figures with inscriptions “Plywood activist No.999996” and so on to “Plywood activist No.1000000”. As I saw it, this people intended to provoke certain verbal or physical conflict. As I saw, this people told that most of the participants had been paid to come there. The fight didn’t occur, though somebody took their figures away and crushed them. Besides, I saw nothing unusual or suspicious on the way of the demonstration to the Udarnik cinema hall." As it was found out from participants’ evidence, it was possible to enter Yakimanka Street not only from the Kaluzhskaya Square but also from other points: PE No. 89 “I decided not to stay in a queue on Kaluzhskaya Square and tried to pass faster. As I had to wait for more than an hour, I went along Zhitnaya Street to B. Polyanka Street. There were almost no people in Polyanka street, that is why, when going in the 1st Khvostovoy lane, I saw a group of about 15 young people at the age of 16 to 19. They looked like the so-called aggressive youth, something like semibums/semifans wearing hoods and keffiyeh. I went on and saw that in the public garden where Yakimanka Street crosses Polyanka Stree,t the area is blocked with cordons. Near the cordons a Police Captain was on duty. I wanted to call my friends I was waiting for. In a few minutes there came young people I saw in Khvostovoy lane. They came directly to the Captain, who showed them a direction and explained something. The group was gone and I followed them in a few minutes. It turned out that there was a path to Yakimanka Street behind the public garden and in front of the metallic fence. Yakimanka Street was bordered with the cordons and in front of them there was a street cleaning machine, standing at an angle of 45 degrees. Behind it there was a breach in the cordon with three to five policemen of junior grades. I passed through the cordon and the policemen didn’t pay any attention to me”; PE No. 148 “Firstly I tried to cross Luzhkov Bridge, but there were OMON agents on it and they did not let people to the opposite side. That’s why I went further to Maly Kamenny Bridge and easily crossed to the Udarnik cinema hall. No control measures were implemented there, no arches were installed. Anyone could pass through this place and carry any things they wanted. Before the column arrived at the Bolotnaya Square, there were about 500 people or more. Among them there were about 20 young nashists, who were trying to distribute insulting leaflets, perhaps, with the purpose of disputes and confrontations provocation. But honestly, they were acting rather inertly”; PE No. 220 “I saw that there was almost no examination at one place. It was at the corner of Maly Kamenny Bridge and Kadashevskaya Embankment. People passed through the metallic barrier opened by the police officer. Afterwards I passed there too.” 4.2.4 The demonstration from the Kaluzhskaya Square to Yakimanka Street4:20 PM the first columns began to move behind schedule, at about 4:20 PM. The movement along Yakimanka Street was slow and calm (PE Nos. 9, 10, 12). Most participants were in good mood. The weather was fine. People in the columns were joking and laughing. They carried balloons, posters and large banners. People chanted slogans. In the course of the demonstration, the MSU students had time to make a small performance. PE No. 34 “People were armed with smiles and posters”; PE No. 51 “People were in an expansive, almost festive, mood. I saw young people with little children, disabled persons. There were many people from other towns. Everybody was happy that we are many, and nobody expected any inadequate actions of the authorities. There was no need for such actions”; PE No. 69 “People were not aggressive, they were good-natured and in a festive mood, towards the police as well, they even congratulate them no the holidays. The public was worthy, both youth and adults”; PE No. 71 “There were only kind, lively and cheerful faces at the beginning of demonstration”; PE No. 103 “There was very good mood at the beginning of the demonstration, all people were joking, laughing at the posters, chanting slogans. The participants were different but absolutely peaceful. They reminded of me of the May demonstrations, which I participated as a schoolgirl”; PE No. 125 “There was warm atmosphere, fine weather, easy communication among the people, no calls for violence and eve a small performance of MSU students”; PE No. 130 “In my opinion, the participants behave as usual during similar events, i.e. very peacefully. The atmosphere was free and easy. I saw many cheerful, calm faces. People were glad to the spring, the sun; they communicated,, read poems”. Many people brought their families, parents and little children, with them. There were wheelchair persons in the columns: PE No. 18 “It seemed to be quite normal before we reached the Bridge. There was nothing worrying at all, we took children with us, by the way, if we thought there would be a fight we wouldn’t have taken children with us surely. But we supposed everything would be peaceful and people who sought for extreme situations should have gone to Manezhka. The Bolotnaya Square was approved”; PE No. 32 “I participated in all approved opposition assemblies. That is why I easily took my 15-year-old boys with me. The people at the demonstrations and meetings I had visited before had been calm, kind and unaggressive”; PE No. 15 “I remember the brass band, the music and the festive mood of the demonstration”; PE No. 42 “Many people brought children with them, the whole families came there. I remember an old veteran of the Great Patriotic War, who was all of a sweat”; PE No. 76 “Many people took children with them, they brought baby carriages, the atmosphere was absolutely relaxing”; PE No. 93 “My wife, two children, my fellow-student and me got out of the Oktyabrskaya underground station station and joined the demonstration towards the Bolotnaya Square”; PE No. 96 “I saw nothing unusual while moving along Yakimanka Street. The people at the demonstration were peaceful; many of them brought children with them. Many women worn high heels”; PE No. 156 “I was moving among well-wishing people. I saw people with children, one child sat on his father’s neck, there were children in baby carriages. I saw a woman calling her friend and saying something like “Come here, the weather is fine, let’s take a walk”; PE No. 162 “In my opinion, the demonstrators were a festive Sunday crowd with children and balloons”. Almost all following participants’ evidence (Nos. 175, 177, 183, 196, 226, 235, 241, 251, 258, 283, 290, 295, 307, 308, 318, 327, 332, 327, 371, 388, 394, 398, 407, 412, 417, 428 etc.) confirmed the previous quotations about the mood of the participants. In general everything was as usual as all similar assemblies – no excesses, civilized people not intending to commit any acts of violence or provocations. There was a very pleasant atmosphere which cannot be spoiled by separate groups of inadequate young people wearing sports clothes. They were trying to provoke people around them to begin fighting, yelled abusive phrases towards the participants. PE No. 298 “They rudely ruffled the participants and yelled provocative slogans. But they paid for this. They intended to begin fighting after some people wanted to calm them down, but due to quantitative superiority of the participants they had to retreat”. The group of people in fools’ caps was also ignored by the participants. But the young people in masks who didn’t communicate to anybody and stood apart excited the suspicion: PE No. 193 “To the right of the column, I saw a group of 20-30 young people in black, some of them wearing masks and carrying plastic bags in their arms. One of them had a knuckle-duster. The view of the group stood out from the crowd, and I felt anxious. I informed the police officers, who stood along the column, about the suspicious citizens with prohibited items in the crowd. I called their attention but no actions were taken”; PE No. 258 “A lot of strong young people in black with black bandages on their faces moved close to me. They moved in unity, in an organized way, almost together with the column, but in my opinion they were moving only for a show. They were united by the same target I think. Only before Maly Kamenny Bridge they moved forwards and I didn’t see them in the crowd”; PE No. 506 “I saw people in masks, moving among the crowd, standing nearby each other and not communicating to anybody”; PE No. 473 “When entering Kamenny Bridge and moving along it, I saw a group of very young people with their faces covered with bandages, they made some disorder”; PE No. 514 “I saw a group of organized young people wearing masks and black clothes”. These groups of young people in masks were noticed also in the third and forth rank just behind the opposition leaders: PE No. 280 “It seemed strange for me to see some young people in masks in the very beginning of the column, in the third – forth ranks. They moved in the middle of the column, behind the opposition leaders and didn’t look like a group of young anarchists!”. 4:56 PM The people became really worried only after the fully equipped OMON agents appeared at 4:56 beyond the Bolshoy Yakimansky passage. They began to move parallel to the column. They worn armours and carried truncheons: PE No. 27 “The compact line of OMON continuously moved parallel to the column (at least on its right) when moving along Yakimanka Street. They had armours and truncheons; at the February 2012 demonstration along the same route, no OMON agents were present”. Another part of the OMON team closed the last column. From the outside it looked like “Throwing a cordon around the object”. PE No. 130 “The police officers were unusually gloomy, stressed and hostile. There were some people in masks among the participants, they didn’t communicate to anybody and seemed to look out for somebody or something. Several OMON lines closed the demonstration; they were followed by the vehicles (trucks if I am not mistaken). All these facts together with the stress and hostility of the OMON agents made me feel that they were preparing some force actions, despite the fact that the participants were peaceful, the atmosphere was cheerful and free and easy”. As the columns reached Kamenny Bridge the separate athletic young people in masks were seen with increasing frequency. They still did not to communicate to anybody and stood apart (participants’ evidence Nos. 19, 21, 31, 42, 48, 9, 96, 110, 116, 118, 154, 180, 252). Right on Maly Kamenny Bridge the movement stopped. The first columns met the lines of conscript soldiers of internal forces, followed by the OMON agents fully equipped with uniform No.4 (a helmet, a flak jacket, knee-pads, shoulder straps, shields and gloves with protective shields). On Bolshoy Kamenny Bridge people saw more lines of OMON and heavy street cleaning machines, followed by buses with OMON agents. People stood paralyzed with such a display of armed force. The demonstration was stopped by a blocking detachment. 4.2.5 Contact of the column with the interior troops, OMON and police forces at the end of Maly Kamenny Bridge4:45 PM The first groups of “unorganized” demonstrators reached the cordon. The density of the people was not very high at that moment, and the demonstrators could see the overall picture. However, people met some difficulties passing to Bolotnaya Embankment, because the width of the passage leaved by the police cordon on the right side of the end of Maly Kamenny Bridge, which actually is 40 meters long, was only 10 meters. This caused a traffic jam at the entrance. Though the first unorganized groups of the demonstrators managed to pass through the bottleneck-wide passage to the stage with a certain delay. On their way, they had to pass through the second line of arches set up in the area of Luzhkov Bridge and to be personally searched for the second time. The number of the arches was considerably less than at the entrance to Yakimanka Street nearby the Oktyabrskaya underground station, which inevitably caused serious obstacles for the pass of the first column. 5:02-5:10 PM The main “organized” column reached the cordon. The width of the passage to the Embankment leaved by the police cordon was not enough for the column with banners to turn free to Bolotnaya Embankment. The passage to the Square and Repin public garden was simply closed. PE No. 153 “As we came to the Maly Kamenny Bridge hump, our first lines were stricken because the area in front of Bolshoi Kamennyi Bridge was covered with OMON equipment sparkling in the sun, surrounded with several lines of heavy machines! They looked like crusaders at Battle of the Ice or like Germans at the Kursk salient! In a few steps we reached the thin line (only one row!) of recruits in helmets, which extended diagonally from the left end of the Bridge to Bolotny garden. It was impossible to turn the line left without running into [police officers]!”. It should be noted that the narrow passage to the Embankment left by the police could not even be seen from the second line of the demonstrators (participants’ evidence Nos. 16 and 315) PE No. 16 “As I pushed myself to the right end of the Bridge, I saw the entrance to the Embankment several meters wide (!!!), which was not blocked by the OMON agents. It was possible to find out an exit in such a crowd only from this very place.”. 5:22 PM The main column of people carrying banners was held back by the police cordon. The action leaders sat in the middle of Maly Kamenny Bridge protesting against the fact that the demonstration is not allowed to the meeting, and with intention to underline the peaceful and non-violent character of the protest (video-evidence of participant No. 531, part 3, 20'30 http://youtu.be/0vWRHahkgoo). The participants have different opinions about this sit-in: most of them consider it was undoubtedly justified and helped to prevent a crush, some of them believe that the sit-in could only stimulate such a crash. According to the evidence of the participants, the first lines could see the actual situation and could hear the calls to keep on the right, but at a small distance from police cordon there was no possibility to get any information on the reasons for the column to stop and on the situation at its first lines. (Participants’ evidence Nos. 52, 124, 334, 380).
The arriving participants ran slap into the end of the column which was on the Bridge, and involuntarily increased the pressure to those who stood in front of them: PE No. 106 “The growing tension at the area in front of the Udarnik cinema hall promoted the conflict because people from behind continued to arrive and people were not allowed to go further (in both directions). Though people who stood straight before the cordon didn’t take any measures and tried not to contact the cordon and not to weigh on it”. Several dozens of people joined the sit-in; they sat down in the middle of the Maly Kamenny Bridge roadway. There were several lines of standing participants between them and the cordon, press photographers and news camera persons tried to push themselves through, there was a 1-meter wide passage in front of the formation of the interior troops and police forces. Such a state was kept for a considerable period of time. Several demonstrators in the end of the column who got tired of long standing because of unknown reasons also sat down: PE No. 30 “The police didn’t let people go to the meeting. It was very crowded there; I was tired to stand for a long time, so I sat down as the people next to me did. Then I tried to leave this place, but there were people everywhere and I was not able to pass. At that time I was detained”; PE No. 18 “As we arrived, everyone was standing and it was said people were not let to pass further. We stood for a while on the Bridge, then people began to sit down (our children thought it was some kind of a game and sat down too)”. Some of the participants began to move to Kadashevskaya Embankment: PE No. 181 “I moved at the end of the column. When reaching Kamennyi Most, the column stopped, but we saw that Bolotnaya Square was empty. Though we suspended something prevented people from going into Bolotnaya Square, we (there were two of us) decided to move along the opposite side of the Embankment to the stage, to see and hear the meeting. We were let out of the column and we moved on the Emabnkment, opposite to Bolotnaya Square, to the stage. Luzhkov Bridge was blocked by OMON”; PE No. 330 “I stopped in the middle of Maly Kamenny Bridge together with other people, stayed for about five minutes, returned and moved along Kadashevskaya Embankment to Luzhkov Bridge, then tried to get to Bolotnaya Emabankment. In fifteen minutes I managed to get through and reached the stage. I went away along Vodootvodny channel across Maly Moskvoretsky Bridge, in Bolshaya Ordynka to the Tretyakovskaya subway station”; PE No. 349 “Fifteen minutes before the fighting broke out I had left Maly Kamenny Bridge and went to Kadashevskaya Embankment”. Many participants noted the presence of groups of evident provokers, who were not the demonstrators, at the time of standing and sitting on the bridge. One group, pushing the crowd away got from the Udarnik cinema hall to the entry to Kadashevskaya Embankment (participants’ evidence Nos. 180 and 252), the others on the contrary aggressively tried to push them forward (participants’ evidence Nos. 91, 103, 138, 286, 303, 322, 356, 373). From the Udarnik cinema hall side, across the police cordon, according to the participants’ evidence, a group of people in dark jackets was let through. They moved actively along the police cordon and provoked the participants and the police for conflict (participants’ evidence Nos. 164, 194, 260) PE No. 194 “Then, from the side of Udarnik, straight along the police cordon there appeared some guys in masks hiding their faces. I didn’t count them, but I think they were 20-30. They behaved insolently, defiantly, cursed loudly and pushed everyone. Then, two of them turned and tried to break the cordon by taking me by the arms. After I managed to defend myself with my elbows, they looked at me with astonishment, swore and went away”. 5:10-5:20 PM At the same time with the sit-in on the bridge, the performance of the musicians who anticipated the meeting began (particularly, the band Rabfak). 5:30-5:35 E. Domozhirov from Vologda spoke. Then N. Mitiushkina announced that “the organizers of the meeting apologize, but neither the meeting leaders, nor the speakers were not able to come as they all are there (and showed to the Udarnik cinema holl). If anybody can support them – please do!” 5:40 PM M. Feigin took the word and reported the same information about the facts that the main speakers were not prevented from coming to the Bolotnaya, they began the sit-in and asked everybody to join them (http://youtu.be/7wzpXY6AezY). Then the sound was switched off and most of those present moved back. The police forces at the arches at Luzhkov Bridge refused to let the meeting participants to the side of Maly Kamenny Bridge. 5:45-5:50 PM Under the people’s pressure, the passage towards the Udarnik cinema hall was opened and the flow of the participants directed towards the turn to the embankment (5:52, video filming by V. Aleksandrov-4, 10’30”). The police rapidly restored the cordon, passing through meeting area at the section of Luzhkov Bridge (to 5:50 PM, PE No. 535, fig. № 1, filming time 17:51 // http://youtu.be/FDt0hk6e-ao). 5:46-5:57 PM Just before the demonstrators began to come back from the stage, prison trucks (PAZ buses and KAMAZ trucks with closed body) arrived at Serafimovich Street from under Bolshoy Kamenny Bridge, additional OMON forces began to move from Bolshoy Kamenny Bridge (at 5:38, video filming by V. Aleksandrov-3, http://youtu.be/ycmZIW5aJb0, http://youtu.be/qhwtsxJWRSM, http://youtu.be/P8vjGiiq-l4), the OMON operation groups of 10-12 persons, who later were involved in detaining people, had been behind the police cordon for a long time (are present at the video at 17:10 of video-evidence of participant No. 531, part 3. http://youtu.be/re25wFWmGkQ). Some of the participants, who came back from the stage, stood before the cordon on Bolotnaya Embankment, others pushed themselves through to Maly Kamenny Bridge. The sit-in participants had to rise to their feet to avoid the crush. During the sit-in, V. Lukin, the ombudsman, Nikolay Svanidze, the member to the Civic Chamber and journalist, Gennady Gudkov and Dmitry Gudkov, the deputies, repeatedly tried to hold negotiations regarding passage widening to let the column move to Bolotnaya Embankment, but they didn’t succeed. G. Gudkov’s evidence (No. 584) “I came back to Biryukov and his companions and said “let’s move the line and just open at least a part of the park to let the people move so the incident would be over ” (see also participants’ evidence Nos. 53, 118, 131, 304, 315 and participants’ video-evidence No. 531 part 4, 12’25” – 14’30” showing their return to the march column at 5:54 – 5:57 PM http://youtu.be/FNYLnYAaRqE). 5:58:30” PM some movement in the column on Maly Kamenny Bridge started (PE No.72 – “it began to move”). This time (Minaev-TV, part 4. http://youtu.be/1SKUyIPgCuE?t=20m) a flow in the crowd towards Maly Kamenny Bridge and Bolotnaya Embankment appeared. There was some kind of rupture of the police line at the corner of Bolotnaya Embankment. Then the policemen made those “two steps forward”, which, according to the participants’ evidences, caused the breach. These OMON two steps forward made the crowd more compact despite the fact that it was constantly compressing by the flow (participants’ evidence Nos. 131, 171, 315, 353; 380; 401) and, perhaps, by the pushes of the provokers (participants’ evidence Nos. 151, 171, 315, 401, 531 – http://youtu.be/Q67Q8RNAJac), followed with the provocative calls (participants’ evidence Nos. 151 and 472):
The breach was made by strange criminally-looking people (http://youtu.be/NtfoIobwwjc). They seem to be mentioned at the participants’ evidence Nos. 48, 53, 117, 418, 369, 480. Almost at the same time, the police line on the left, near the Udarnik cinema hall, and on the right, at the turn to Bolotnaya Embankment, disappeared. Meanwhile, the organizers of the meeting, particularly S. Udaltsov, A. Sakhnin, B. Nemtsov, tried to do their best to prevent the crash and send the flow to Bolotnaya Embankment. The pressure of the crowd threw most of people behind the rest of the police cordon almost immediately. Even people from remote lines appeared at the breach (participants’ evidence Nos. 13, 316, 322, 395, 532 – 00110, 6:06 http://youtu.be/fbdIqSsPs18). After the so called breach, the tension of the crowd receded and nobody tried to pass from the Maly Kamenny Bridge side (PE No. 153). People who were pushed into the square didn’t try to break to Bolshoy Kamenny Bridge:
Most people stopped just behind the line of the broken police cordon (“Moscow-24” Channel video http://youtu.be/a2hlcrAWfnA), some of them joined hands (PE No. 12), others just didn’t know where to go (PE Nos. 96 and 165), still others moved towards the Bolotnaya Square public garden (PE Nos. 52, 322, 281, 478) or towards Bolotnaya Embankment (PE No. 153), some people moved towards the Udarnik cinema hall (PE Nos. 395, 353), most of the people were pushed back to the crowd (video of the “Moscow-24” Channel http://youtu.be/pkRBT9TU8a4) by the OMON second line (PE Nos. 24, 61, 336, 316, 302). Almost all of those who remained at the square were for no reason detained by the police and sent to prison trucks (PE Nos. 401, 396, 380, 344, 293, 268, 209). Besides, the police began to pull out separate participants and demonstrators, who didn’t try to break through the cordon (in such a way B. Akimenkov was detained and now he is on remand under the Bolotnaya Square case).
Within 4 to 5 minutes after to breach, the narrow passage at the turn from Maly Kamenny Bridge to Bolotnaya Embankment remained widened and most people managed to move to the embankment. This, together with the breach, prevented the mass crash. The cordon was fully restored in about 4 minutes. 18:04 The reinforced lines of OMON started to ram those who remained on Maly Kamenny Bridge, the people were moved towards Kadashevskaya Embankment under the threat of an endangering crash (participants’ evidence Nos. 24, 99 167) and to detain those getting on the way (participants’ evidence Nos. 99, 146): PE No. 24 “People in front of me began to fall down, so did I, and somebody fell over me. I suffocated with the weight of bodies and stretched my arm. Nobody helped me, except one OMON agent, I wish to thank him. Then I helped others to stand up and left the meeting through Luzhkov Bridge, as my condition was pretty bad. When falling, I injured my hip soft tissues. The haematoma still reminds me of those events”. The other OMON line was standing perpendicularly to the first one pushing the demonstrators down Bolotnaya Embankment. As a result, the participants were divided into three parts: on Maly Kamenny Bridge, on Bolotnaya Embankment from Maly Kamenny Bridge to Luzhkov Bridge (to the OMON cordon), and from Luzhkov Bridge to the stage. |