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WORLD NEWS Thursday 1 augusT 2019

Moscow couple shaken but defiant after police crackdown

MOSCOW (AP) — The ting on a curb. He curled up
young woman screamed as police hit him with their
as her boyfriend lay atop batons, and Kudracheva
her, absorbing the blows of tried to intervene. Nearby
a helmeted riot policeman. police dogs barked and
It's one of the indelible im- howled.
ages of the violent police Moments later, she was on
response to an unauthor- the pavement with Kanto-
ized protest in Moscow. rovich atop her.
Inga Kudracheva's ter- "The scariest moment was
ror and anguish are clear when I was lying under-
in the video and photos neath Boris ... and I felt as
that spread across Russian if the policeman was jump-
social media and foreign ing on him," said Kudrache-
news coverage of the July va, a 27-year-old human
27 crackdown in which an resources specialist. "I felt
arrest-monitoring group like he was going to crush
said nearly 1,400 people my chest."
were detained. "We were not doing any-
Yet Kudracheva and Bo- thing," Kudracheva said
ris Kantorovich say the or- of the minutes before the
deal has only strengthened melee. "We were not trying
them. to break the cordons, we
"People are not afraid In this July 27, 2019, file photo, protesters clash with police during an unsanctioned rally in Mos- weren't throwing anything
of police anymore. Even cow. at the police."
though police were beat- Associated Press Kantorovich was shoved
ing us violently and tried to into a police van; after ar-
intimidate us, it was worth ing the exclusion of some Ivan Sustin, a human-rights strong-arm response is a riving at a police station, he
it," the 27-year-old told The opposition and indepen- lawyer, said the police vio- warning to Russians that called for an ambulance
Associated Press on Tues- dent candidates from a lence was at a level previ- people who take to the and went to a hospital for
day, sitting on a sofa with Sept. 8 election for the ously seen only in a 2012 streets, no matter how treatment of heavy bruises.
Kudracheva and occa- Moscow city council. In demonstration against peaceful, to demand free Kudracheva suffered only
sionally squeezing her hand the past month, the issue President Vladimir Putin's and fair elections will face scratches.
reassuringly. has provoked a surprising- inauguration and that the dire consequences." By coincidence, Kudrache-
"I'm really scared, but be- ly large outcry for a local recent protesters were far But Russian authorities show va also figured in one of the
ing scared is fine, and there election; on July 20, about less aggressive. no sign of backing down. day's other stunning visual
are other things more im- 20,000 people turned out The police action came In his first public comments scenes, helping to wrap
portant than fear," said for a demonstration that amid declining approval on the disorder, Moscow gauze on the head of Alex-
Kantorovich, who works in was the largest in the city in rates for Putin and the dom- Mayor Sergei Sobyanin andra Parushina, her face
sales. several years. inant United Russia party, said Tuesday the protesters masked with blood, after
Such determination sug- But that earlier demonstra- whose nominees suffered "forced police to use force she was beaten by police
gests that the fierce police tion had been sanctioned. crushing defeats in several that in this situation was at a different site.
response might have been When the July 27 protest gubernatorial elections last completely appropriate." Parushina, a deputy in a
a miscalculation, harden- was called, authorities fall. At the same time, Russia's Moscow district council,
ing resistance rather than were clearly determined to There has been wide- Investigative Committee told AP she hadn't known
dissipating it. Both police stifle the dissent. spread condemnation of opened a criminal inves- Kudracheva before that
and activists likely will be The police actions were the crackdown. The U.S. tigation for charges of or- earlier incident.
tested again on Saturday, "demonstrative cruelty," Embassy in Moscow de- ganizing or participating in The beating left her with
as protest organizers have said Ilya Shablinsky, head cried it as "use of dispropor- mass disorder, a crime that stitches in her head and se-
called for another unsanc- of the voters' rights com- tionate police force." carries a potential prison vere bruises, and she said
tioned rally in the Russian mittee of the presidential Hugh Williamson, Human sentence of up to 15 years. she was so unwell that she
capital. human rights council, in an Rights Watch's director for During the July 27 demon- couldn't leave her apart-
There have been a series of interview with the newspa- Europe and Central Asia, stration, police tried to grab ment. But she said she's
demonstrations denounc- per Kommersant. said the "government's Kantorovich as he was sit- ready for future protests.q