Press release, 22.08.2016
The initiative group founded by the YABLOKO party appealed to the election commission of St.Petersburg to initiate a referendum against naming one of the city’s bridges after Akhmad Kadyrov, first President of the Chechen Republic, which was done by the authorities despite loud public protests. The application will be considered within two weeks.

It is already the third attempt to authorise a city-wide referendum concerning the decision to name the bridge across the Duderhof canal after Akhmad Kadyrov. The first two appeals were declined on formal grounds.

YABLOKO claims that the decision of the St. Petersburg toponymic commission to name the bridge after Chechnya’s first President Akhmad Kadyrov, which was obviously made in a rush and under the pressure of the city hall, indicates that the authorities are not interested in the opinion of the citizens.

“Akhmad Kadyrov has nothing to do with the history or culture of St.Petersburg. Moreover, the name of Akhmad Kadyrov is associated not only with the death of thousands of Russian citizens during the Chechen war but with the totalitarian regime established in the Republic of Chechnya,” runs the party statement.

Renowned film director Alexander Sokurov, deputies of the St.Petersburg Legislative Assembly Boris Vishnevsky and Alexander Kobrinsky, YABLOKO Deputy Chair Nikolai Rybalov, Chair of St.Petersburg YABLOKO Mikhail Amosov and other politicians joined the initiative group.