More than 100 arrested as they protest Russian election

MOSCOW —  Protesters who took to the streets of the Russian capital Monday to demonstrate against the weekend presidential election were roughed up and carted off in buses by throngs of riot police.

More than 100 activists were detained as they tried to gather in central Moscow, opposition leaders said.

The protests were planned as a rare show of opposition to the Kremlin political machine that successfully passed the presidency from former KGB agent Vladimir Putin to his protege and favored successor, Dmitry Medvedev.

As expected, Russian voters handed Medvedev a landslide Sunday in a race that many critics said was over before it began. From the moment Putin tapped Medvedev as his successor, images of the lawyer saturated state-run media while his lesser-known opponents scrapped for exposure.

“I came here to protect the honor of my country, which was humiliated by this fake vote organized by the authorities,” said Svetlana Torskaya, a 68-year-old architect who came out into the snow to demonstrate against the Kremlin. “They stole the real elections from us and made us take part in a show.”

European election monitors Monday leveled mixed criticism against the balloting, pointing to problems with voter registration and complaining of unequal access to media. The election was not free, the monitors concluded, but the results still reflected the will of the Russian people.

“We think there is not freedom in this election,” Andreas Gross, head of the monitoring team from the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, told reporters. The election “amounted, in effect, to a vote of confidence in the incumbent president.”

Medvedev gathered a little more than 70% of the vote, far outdistancing his three opponents, and in his first public statements carefully pledged to continue Putin’s policies. The new president will start work in the Kremlin in May, and nobody in Russia really knows how the power structure will shape up.

Putin, who was prevented under the Russian Constitution from seeking a third term, has said he will serve as prime minister under Medvedev. Critics fear he will continue to run the country, using the new president as a partner or, at worst, a puppet.

Members of Russia’s beleaguered opposition had been denied permission to gather at Turgenevskaya Square, in the heart of the capital. But leaders went ahead and called for Monday’s march to go forward.

Protesters arrived by subway to find the square sealed off by soldiers with metal shields and iron helmets. Riot police with clubs roamed the square in search of possible dissenters. They targeted young men, grabbing them by their hands and legs and dragging them off to police buses.

One by one, the activists made their small shows of protest. One young man pulled a flare from his pocket and lighted it. “We need a different Russia!” he yelled. Police beat him to the ground and dragged him away.

Another demonstrator unfurled a banned Bolshevik Party flag over his head. Others linked arms and repeated the chant, “We need a different Russia!”

They too were hauled off to the bus.

Nearby, human rights activist Lev Ponomaryov stood talking with reporters.

“These elections took place the way elections are held in totalitarian regimes,” said Ponomaryov, leader of the organization For Human Rights.

A few minutes later, he had to stop talking. The riot police were coming for him too. They ferried him off through the wet snow to the waiting bus.

megan.stack@latimes.com