Press Release, 20.04.2023

Photo: The May Day demonstration in Novosibirsk, 2018 / Photo by the Novosibirsk branch of Yabloko

The Novosibirsk branch of Yabloko, in accordance with the decision of the Bureau of the regional branch, has submitted a notification to the Mayor’s Office about the organisation of the May Day demonstration, which is traditional for the regional branch. Yabloko formulated two topical themes of the event: “For Peace” and “Against Violation of the Constitutional Rights of Citizens in the New Law on Electronic Call-Up Papers”.

The applicants are waiting for the answer of the Mayor’s Office within three working days, but, according to the experience of the Novosibirsk Yabloko in recent years, this decision may be negative. The organisers say that they will consider changing the venue of the action in the Mayor’s Office proposes to do so.

The message about the event is for informational purposes and is not a call for participation. Due to the fact that the demosntration has not yet been agreed upon, the information on the place and time of the action are not specified.

It should be noted that earlier, the Yabloko branch in St. Petersburg filed a notification to the authorities of the city of Murino on the outskirts of St.Petersburg to hold the first rally in Russia against electronic call-up papers, indicating the location of the action as the city of Murino adjacent to St.Petersburg, because of the COVID ban on public rallies in St.Petersburg which does not apply to the Leningrad Region. For the first time, the organisers were denied the permission for the action under an absurd pretext: the administration was not satisfied that the application was submitted electronically. In response to the repeated notification submitted on paper, the officials refused saying that the document had been allegedly sent late to them.