EU and USA disturbed by the crushing of demonstrations in Russia

Spokesperson for the European Union Christiane Homann has stated that the Ministers of Foreign Affairs of EU members will raise this issue during a meeting with their Russian colleagues next week in Luxembourg.

In Washington White House spokesperson Dean Perino said that the USA “was deeply concerned by the harsh manner” in which the demonstrations had been dispersed.

During the “Marches of those in dissent” [“Marshy nyesoglasnykh”] over the last weekend in Russia around 170, or up to 250 demonstrators were detained on Saturday in Moscow, and around 100 – 120 on Sunday in St Petersburg.

According to human rights defenders, some of those detained were brutally beaten.

At the same time, the Governor of St Petersburg Valentina Matviyenko on Monday ordered law enforcement bodies to “scrupulously” check reports of police abuse. The Russian Human Rights Ombudsperson Vladimir Lukin has stated that he would like to see the complaints lodged by demonstrators.

The Moscow Helsinki Group and the movement “For human rights” have announced that they are forming a commission to investigate the circumstances of the organizing and dispersing of the ““Marches of those in dissent”