Press Release, 26.01.2016

UPD. 14:50. Sergei Mitrokhin released. Antonov-Ovseyenko and Belyansky still remain in the police. Mitrokhin accused of violation of the order of organisation of public actions (article 20.2 of the Administrative Violation Code of Russia).

UPD. 14:40. The lawyer is not allowed to enter the police department.

UPD. 12:40. Journalists are not allowed to enter the Kitai-Gorod police department under a pretext that it is a “high security facility”.

UPD. 12:30. Sergei Mitrokhin, Anton Antonov-Ovseyenko and Stanislav Belyansky brought to the Kitai-Gorod police department, the police took away their mobile telephones.

Today, approximately at 12:00, Sergei Mitrokhin, member of YABLOKO’s Federal Political Committee, was detained by the President’s Administration before the action for the resignation of head of Administration of Chechnya Ramzan Kadyrov. He was taken to the police station Kitai-Gorod.

Anton Antonov-Ovseyenko, head of YABLOKO’s community liaison office, was detained together with Mitrokhin.

Sergei Mitrokhin planned to conduct a one-person picket for dismissal of Ramzan Kadyrov, head of administration of Chechnya. He tried to get to the territory of the Presidential Administration with a folded poster, but the police asked him to show his passport. Sergei Mitrokhin did not have a passport. But Antonov-Ovseyenko showed to the police his identity document, so Mitrokhin suggested that the action should be held by Antonov-Ovseyenko. The law enforcement asked Mitrokhin to unfold the poster, then they immediately detained Antonov-Ovseyenko.

“We have always conducted pickets by the Presidential Administration, and everything always ended well. But this time, apparently, the authorities are so much worried by the topic and so scared of it, that we were not even allowed to start the action. Sergei Mitrokhin was detained before the picket began. Certainly, this is connected with the issue of Kadyrov.

Kadyrov’s actions are completely unacceptable, unconstitutional and incite hatred in our society, set the authorities against the opposition.

We have submitted the application to the Public Prosecutor’s Office and the Investigative Committee. We will go on with this issue, we have not competed it yet. We will fight to the end “, Galina Mikhaleva, First Deputy Chair of the Moscow branch of YABLOKO, said.

“I also would like to draw the attention to the fact that our police has been acting already completely unlawfully. So they will grab any passersby on the street without any grounds, ” Mikhaleva added.

Later, because of the actions of an instigator, the police detained activist Stanislav Belyansky.

It should be noted that when, in September 2015, representatives of YABLOKO conducted a one-person picket for the resignation of Pskov Region Governor Turchak by the Presidential Administration, such measures were not taken. Police did not prevent YABLOKO from holding that action.