Thirteen prisoners

13 people are detained for the investigation of the clashes with the police at the Bolotnaya Square. Few people are speaking favorably of them, most of the public knows very little about them, besides the fact that those detained are supposed to be provocateurs and instigators of violence. Among them are: a director of a tourist agency, a young anarchist, a chemist, a skinhead. They have nothing in common, except for the fact that most of them were present at the Bolotnaya Square May 6th 2012. Svetlana Reiter has investigated and found that in fact anyone from that protest could have found himself in their shoes.

Oleg Arkhipenkov

(c)Ksenia Kolesnikova

June 14, Basmannyi Court, noon. Policemen lead a tall muscular brunet wearing dark red jacket and jeans in hall number 19. He is looking around and just before being locked up in a cage he manages to send a smile to the pretty dark haired young woman in the first row.

“Everything is going to be fine”, whisper her lips, he is nodding in return.

The brunet’s name is Oleg Arkhipenkov, he is 27 years old. He is one of the 13 people detained in connection with the case of clashes at the Bolotnaya Square. He is being charged with beating two special force policemen and breaking the chain of policemen between the Malyi Kamennyi Bridge and the Bolotnaya Square, in other words, organization of mass riots as per parts 1, 2 and 3 of the article 212 of the Criminal Code of Russian Federation. Today the judge should hand a verdict whether Arkhipenkov should be left in jail till the trial, or released with the written undertaking not to leave.

The young woman in the first row is Nastya, she is Arkhipenkov’s wife. Arkhipenkov is a director in a tourist agency. The judge is reading the witness account, that “Policeman Litvinov has definitively recognized Archipenkov as a person, who has been throwing stones at him”. Nastya tells me, that her husband has not even been at the Bolotnaya Square that day. «We have parted in subway at 4 PM, on the Koltsevaya line. He went on his business, I went on mine. At 7 PM he has called me from the police station and told me that he was arrested near metro station Teatralnaya.»

Arkhipenkov is common looking and his life, according to Nastya, is unremarkable too, not counting a small narcotics possession charge a long time ago. Ten years ago he has spent a year in jail. Six months ago he has met Nastya, a tour operator. He has never attended any protests. On may 6th everything was pretty standard, police car, police station, court hearing for «disobeying a lawful order from a police officer», a thousand rouble fine ($30), freedom.

He has married Nastya on May 23rd 2012. They were going to have a honeymoon in the middle of July, either on Bali, or on Maldives. But on June 10th Oleg has not returned home from work. He was arrested in the street and detained in isolation on Petrovka, 38 – a crime fighting center in Moscow.

Nastya is whispering expletives as she looks in the window on the summer, heat and customers in need of tours, possibly to Bali and Maldives. She is convinced that her husband is innocent. «We even have not hired a lawyer. Why? The judge will sort it out. Do you know, how much food I have prepared?»

This very moment the judge Karpov says that he «does not see any impediment from keeping Arkhipenkov under arrest till the trial», and leaves him under arrest till August 10th.

Nastya's face is all angry tears.

Vladimir Akimenkov

On that day in Basmannyi Court four more people were arrested in the connection with the Bolotnay case. At 1 PM a Left Front activist Vladimir Akimenko had to enter the cage. He was detained in the evening of May 6th and he is also charged with breaking the chain of police from the bridge to the square. The judge Karpov is reading aloud a reference for Akimenkov: «Well known as an active participant of protest meetings. Has a habit of filming police officers actions during public events. Refuses to cooperate with the police.»

His comrades from the Left Front are whispering among themselves in outrage. The defendant's lawyer Dmitry Agranovsky is speaking: «Your Honor, since when is an active participation in the protests considered to be negative? As far as I understand, we are still living in a free country!» Karpov is keeping silence.

Two years ago Akimenkov was given a suspended sentence according to the article 282 of the Criminal Code. His own mother have wrote to the police about leaflets she has found. This time there are even more reasons for his incarceration, according to the investigation. «Mr. Akimenkov was in the group of 400 people who have broken the chain of the policemen and continued illegitimate demonstration, he also tried to evade arrest, hiding in the crowd.» Attached to the case are the questioning protocols of a witness, a policeman from special forces. There are no photo or video evidence. Akimenkov refuses to testify and maintains that he is innocent.

He is left under arrest till August 10th.

Richard Sobolev

In the court hall next door there is another hearing under way, the one of thin construction worker Richard Sobolev. He was arrested on May 10th, the search at his home has unearthed a mask with eye holes and a flag of the movement against illegal immigration. In 2010 he was connected to the case of a neo nazi gang, which attacked immigrant workers back in 2007/2008. He was acquitted for the lack of evidence.

Lawyer Alexander Vassiliev is describing Sobolev: «He is from a simple family, a typical teenager, does not make an impression of an intellectual. I would not be surprised, if he was detained in a company of people who were breaking the law. But he is not a leader. He is a typical follower.» Sobolev does not consider himself guilty. Human rights lawyer Anna Karetnikova about Sobolev: «Police investigators wanted to find out from him, who else was on the square, who were the leaders. They promised to release him with the written undertaking not to leave in exchange for evidence. He did not believe them. He does not want to give evidence, because «investigators can use it against him». He thinks that he is arrested because of the former brush with the law, they «failed to jail him then and are trying harder this time.»

He is also remaining under arrest till August 10th.

Alexander Kamensky

At first a peaceful looking chubby guy, an activist from the party «The Other Russia», was also left in jail till the trial, but on June 20 he was allowed to go home with the written undertaking not to leave. His friends maintain, that he was not present at the Bolotnaya Square on May 6th, he was taken at the Revolution Square. Sergey Fomchenkov, The Other Russia member is explaining: «We know very well, that when something happens, we are to blame. This is why we have decided not to go to Bolotnaya at all, and walk from the Revolution Square to Manezh instead.» The case has an arrest protocol attached, which says that Alexander was indeed arrested at the Revolution Square. There are also two witnesses, who were arrested and taken to the police with him, but the court declined reviewing the evidence they could provide.

Artem Savelov

Another suspect in the Bolotnaya case – Artem Savelov. He is olive skinned, a bit on a shorter side, with some grey in his hair. He has trouble answering questions on his own because of a bad stutter. Investigation maintains, that Savelov has actively resisted the police and shouted «Get rid of the police state!» a few times. It is impossible to believe that someone who has trouble saying even «yes» and «no» would be able to shout a whole phrase.

Michael Kosenko

One of the thirteen detainees, Michael Kosenko, is disabled. Investigators say, that he was beating up a special force policeman. Kosenko has a second degree disability, he has a psychology problem, which has worsened since he was beaten while serving in the army. Despite his diagnosis and despite the fact that particular policeman «does not remember who was beating him », Kosenko is still under arrest.

Just kids

Looking at the list of the detainees, it is hard not to notice, that most of the potential «riot participants» have barely turned 20. The most famous is only 18. Alexandra Dukhanina, a participant of protests against cutting the forests in Khimki and Zhukovsky, a permanent fixture in the Occupy camp on Chistye Prudy, she was arrested in the street on May 27th. Two weeks prior to her arrest, internet was flooded with the pictures where a giant policeman was dragging the tiny Alaxandra by the neck. Thanks to this shot Alexandra has inadvertently become a sort of an icon of the protest movement. Her lawyer Yefremov is saying, that «She was the first one arrested, because she became too visible.» He is describing his client: «She is basically a teenager, she was born on Cyprus, lives in Moscow with her aunt. She graduated from high school here and was admitted to the Moscow State University, where she was majoring in German language. She did not like it and she dropped out of the university. After that she took some chance jobs, wanted to work in Krishna center and was considering getting back to her studies.

Her friends describe her as a «kind person, bringing light». Alexei met Alexandra in the Occupy camp on Chistye Prudy. He tells that Alexandra is a vegetarian, an activist of the movement «Food instead of Bombs» and a big protector of stray animals. Her girlfriends think that she has changed, ever since she has got together with some anarchists last winter. She started cutting her hair really short and kept admiring the sense of brotherhood among anarchists.

Efremov thinks, that «she is just a girl who has fallen in with the wrong crowd. Eighteen year old people should be studying in college instead of protesting at the Bolotnaya Square.»

Dukhanina is charged with violence towards police officer and riot participation. Her lawyer does not want to comment on that. «The only thing I can say, that she was in the situation, when everybody was throwing something. She threw as well.» There are recordings on the internet with Dukhanina separating from the crowd, throwing something in an unspecified direction and getting back into the crowd. Her friend Alexei says, that he is refusing to believe, that she could throw anything at anyone.

Denis Lutskevich

We are watching videos of the May 6th events on Youtube together with mother of 20 year old student Denis Lutskevich. Her name is Stella, she lives in a small town Lobnya together with her second husband. On the day when Denis went to the protest she was away on vacation in Tunisia. But she was home all right when they came to arrest her son. On June 9th, during the night the started knocking hard on the door. Stella opened the door and the team of policemen burst inside. Denis was brutally apprehended. That was the last time she has seen her son.

Lutskevich is the former Navy Seal. He went to Bolotnaya together with his classmates and college teachers. He never went to demonstrations before, he did not share the point of view with the opposition and most of all, he wanted to enter the Federal Security Forces (Russian Secret Service). It was established, that he went to the demonstration together with a girl named Olga, but they lost each other in the crowd, at the time when the chain of police was being broken. There is a possibility that Olga was being arrested and he tried to help her out. He was arrested too and later released, till that horrible night of June 9th.

We are watching recording, where Denis Lutskevich appears for a moment in the crowd together with a long haired blond girl, in three seconds he is already alone and looking around, as if searching for someone. Few seconds later he is seen shouting something together with a crowd locked between two chains of the police special forces.

While Stella is watching this, her tightly intervined fingers grow whiter with tension.

His lawyer says that Lutskevich was brutally beaten by the police on May 6th. The Sklifosovsky Institute has confirmed that he had bruises on the back of his head, hematoma of the right ear, multiple bruises of back and arms. And a month later he was arrested and brought to the Investigation Committee, where a policeman positively identified Denis as a person, who had ripped off his helmet. There is no recording, showing Denis neither throwing stones, nor ripping helmet off the policeman.

Andrey Bababanov

In order to understand how the detainees were living their lives before being arrested, the correspondent of the Big City Magazine talked to their relatives and friends.

23 year old Katya Minsharapova is a girlfriend of 21 year old Andrey Bababanov. They met three years ago through friends. He has just graduated from the Moscow Math College (High School) and she was already majoring in graphic arts in the Moscow State University of Humanities. Katya tells about their life: «We were living with his mother, Tatyana Nikolayevna. I have completed Aero Graphics class and taught it to Andrey. We did some interior and furniture design. This is how we make our living. Andrey also does dreadlocks and gives private snowboarding lessons. It is a good life.»

In February they went to their first demonstration, «For Fair Elections». Katya continues her story: «We were not into politics, we were living each other. Despite that, we are not out of touch with reality, we understand what kind of country we live in.» On May 6ht they held each other's hands and went to Yakimanka (street leading to the Bolotnaya Square). «There were lots of people, everybody looked happy, cheerful, kids were running around. I have not seen anything like that. Sun was shining, I was wearing a blue mini dress.»

Once at Bolotnaya, they did not notice at first, that the special forces started moving towards the crowd. «They were trying to make people to leave, shouted that the event was over. I looked around, there were lots of different kinds of people, both young and old, well dressed and poor. It felt wrong, that they were making everybody to leave, despite the obvious peaceful nature of the demonstration.»

Andrey kept holding hands with his tiny Katya. Around 6 PM the special forces started cutting the crowd into a few chunks, then plastic bottles and stones started flying towards the police, that is when Katia and Andrey were torn from each other. «I was running around for ten minutes when he called me from somebody else's phone and asked me to bring his passport to the police station Tverskoye. Andrey was badly beaten, all covered with bruises. They kept him there for 24 hours,» remembers Katya.

Later there was a trial, his misdemeanor was an administrative one. They told him at the trial that «24 hours at the police station is your punishment, there will be no more.»

Katya is sobbing. «We went to the trial together. He's got a paper, that everything was fine.»

They lived happily ever before May 28th. That day later in the evening the lights in their apartments went out. «Tatyana Nikalayevna, Andrey's mom opened the door to check the meter. And suddenly the whole crowd bursts into the apartment, mom is thrown aside and somebody is pointing a pistol at me. Andrey gets out of the bathroom, they throw him on the floor, they are not saying anything, mom is screaming and he is tied up and taken away.» Then they started searching the apartment. They took away five pairs of Andrey's jeans, Katya's drawing pad, Andrey's wallet, all computers, phones and hard drives. ON May 30s Andrey Barabanov was taken into custody. When Katya starts remembering the events of that evening, she can't help crying: «I do not have anyone but him. I have buried mom last year, grandmother too. I do not talk to my dad, he has abandoned us. Why is this happening?»

Barabanov was faced with the standard charge of beating up a policeman. There is a video on the net where three muscular guys in black masks are taking on a policeman. After that Andrey in jeans and black mask with white ormnament is seen separating from the crowd and hitting the protective vest of the downed policeman. «It is so silly,» Katya is crying, - «He has lost me, somehow he caught the hysterical mood of the crowd, but he was badly beaten himself. They had to call ambulance to him twice while he was at the police station. He has head injuries. What shall we do now?»

Maxim Luzyanin

Another one of the trirteen suspects was identified on the video of the clashes. His name is Maxim Louzyanin, he is a bodybuilder/restaurateur from around Moscow. At first he did not identify himself on the pictures where people were beating up a policeman at Bolotnaya. Later, he admitted that he was guilty, like Barabanov did before him.

It wold be silly to claim, that nobody attacked the police at Bolotnaya. The chain was indeed broken, and when the police attacked the crowd, when they pushed people and were beating everyone in sight with batons, some people retaliated. There were people, who threw bottles, stones and pieces of the pavement. There were shouts «We are not leaving! We will keep the line intact!» and even «Let's get the mobile toilets down!». Later, there was talk, that there were provocateurs in the crowd. Even if it were true, they were not the main reason for agitating the crowd. The patience of the people was broken on its own, and people went for the chain of police after melting in the sun for one and a half hours.

Two weeks later the slew of arreststs, searches and criminal cases has begun.

Yaroslav Belousov

20 year old politology student Yaroslav Belousov was detained early in the morning and taken away initially just for a few hours. He has not returned home and now his young wife Tamara Likhanova is running with sandwiches for Yaroslav to Petrovka prison, then to his lawyer, and then to her end of year exams. That fills up the whole day. All this time her one year old son is with her, because there is no one to babysit.

We are taking a walk in the Izmaylovsky Park. Tamara is medium height, with long dark blond hair, very attentive, a typical A student. Her son in denim overalls is toddling along a path with us. Tamara is a fourth year student majoring in politology. Her husband has been in solitary confinement for a week. They can't get a permission to visit, so she was walking with the stroller around the prison, hoping that Yaroslav would notice them from his window.

They met during the freshman year, they went to the same class. She was the group leader and he was a perfect student. They started dating after six months and got married a year and a half later. Likhanova say, that they have a «tolerant» family: Tamara's political views are socialist, Yaroslav considers himself a national-democrat, but is not a part of any organization. He does have friends in the Russian Civil Union, because they «are genuinely peaceful». Their coordinator Alexander Chramov says about his organization: «We were born in November 2010, we have a very few members in Moscow, mostly students, graduate students, managers. Our movement is not against anything, it is about government policies. We are against flooding Caucases with money, against horrible immigration policy. We think that they should be able to come on visa. Basically we are a lot like Navalny».

When the movement «For Fair Elections» was born, Yaroslav participated, because it was particularly interesting for him as a political scientist. Twice he served as an election observer and once he served as a member of a local election commission. Tamara says, «he was dissatisfied with the election results and started coming to demonstrations». On May 6th he went to the demonstration as usual, his wife and son were waiting for him at home. Later, when the news reported about unexpected sitting protes at the Udarnik movie theater (next to Bolotnaya), Tamara started worrying. «I was calling Yaroslav and he told me that there was something horrible happening there. I yelled «Get away» and he said «I am getting away». Next time he called from the police minivan».

She asked him about what happened. He said that the police have captured him and dragged to the police minivan. Later she was looking for him at many police stations and found him in the one called Veshnyaki. Next day they let him go. There was a notice about appearing in court. His punishment was one day in jail, which he already had served. Everybody was happy that the nightmare was over.

Yaroslav started preparing for the end of year exams and managed two of them in the beginning of June. The third was set for June 11th, but Belousov was not able to attend.

Tamara keeps telling the story: «Early in the morning June 9th the people in civilian clothes came to our apartment and insisted on Yaroslav getting dressed immediately and going with them. There were five of them. In 15 minutes thay started searching the apartment. We had one table with two computeres, his and mine. They have taken both. I wanted to print pictures of Andryusha, but never got to do that».

They are incriminating him the same «organizing and participation in mass riots at Bolotnaya Square». There is a video, which was shown on TV, where somebody, who could be Belousov, is seen raising his hand. It is impossible to tell from the video, whether he is clutching anything in his hand. Only one thing is certain from this video, Yaroslav is in the crowd, he does not shout anything and does not look even close to the description of «muscular man wearing track suit». That was the exact description of one of the instigators of violence at Bolotnaya both in the media and in blogosphere.

Fedor Bakhov

At the first glance the list of the detainees seems chaotic, but perhaps it does have certain inner logic, as there are people of all sorts. There are members of the opposition and outlawed movements – The Other Russia, The Left Front, The Civil Union. There are a couple of anarchists, there is one skinhead. There are unemployed and a former military man. The soil scientist Fedor Bakhov falls into the category of science workers. According to his relatives and friends he makes an impression of someone, who is not very strong, not the kind who would adjust to anything life can throw at him. Fedor is a late child, brought up by parents and, of course, a grandmother. He graduated from the chemical department of the university, where he was a model student. He has met his wife Svetlana at a dating website, at 21, right after graduating from the university.

Svetlana and Fedor were dating for two years and then got married. Soon they welcomed daughter Anastassia. After staying at home with the baby for three years, Svetlana found a cosmetics consultant job. By that time Fedor was 28, he had a Ph.D. and a job as a lab director in one of the institutes of the Russian Academy of Sciences. They were an average family. Svetlana is smoking at the bench next to their average apartment building in the northern Moscow. Svetlana said that she kept trying to talk Fedor out of going to demonstrations. But he kept going: «Fedor's dad, he is retired, he is very much into politics, they were talking about that all the time. My husband was an observer at the election. Honestly, I used not to care who was in charge of the country. Now, of course, I do.»

She describes the day of the demonstration: «I was not aware that he was going to that demonstration. He was supposed to babysit and I was working. Fedya gave the kid to the grandmother, he told me that he needed to pay an internet bill and that he would be back in a couple of hours. After that, he called around 6 PM from the police station Veshnyaki. To be honest, I was in shock. The same evening his sister Maria and his mom Lyudmila went there to bring him food and some clothes. He refused warm clothes and later regretted that, because it was horribly cold in his camera. They released him in the morning, then there was a court hearing notice, we paid a 500 rouble fine and forgot about it.

They came to their apartment on June 9th at 3 AM in the morning. Svetlana did not open the door: «The baby was still asleep and mom was just out of the hospital. They came again at 6 Am and then we let them in. Thank god, Nastya was sleeping.» Sveta is answering the question about the search: «I can not call them «barbarians», they did not break or throw anything. They took away the computers and the hard drives. They took Fedya and promised to release him in the evening and to give back all the things after checking them out. The policemen, who were searching the apartment apparently were upset, «Why did you need to go to the demonstration? If you, Mr.Bachov, remained here at home, you would not have had any problems.» Fedor told them, that he understood well, that one ought not go to any demonstration in this country.»

Next day at Basmanny Court he was officially put under arrest.

His sister Maria described what happened next, she also was the one, who spread the word in the social networks. «The state attorney Napolov said that Fedor admitted his guilt in writing. He was saying it as if admitting the guilt was a great idea and that the investigator promised to release Fedor with a written undertaking not to leave. Napolov claims, that Fedor wrote about seeing three policemen beating up one man. During the events that followed, Fedor pushed away one of the policemen.» No photo or video evidence of Fedor's guilt was provided by the investigation.

It goes without saying that the soil scientist Fedor Bachov was never released. Svetlana is upset: «Our life has made a 180 degree turn. Our daughter is constantly asking for her dad. What am I supposed to tell her, I do not know. Perhaps that he is on a business trip or at work, anywhere else. He is so kind, so good, he's gotten there because of stupidity.»

Stepan Zimin

The very same words, «kind, good», are used to describe her dance partner, Stepan Zimin, by his best friend Sasha Kunko.

We are watching a video of slim Sasha Kunko and bulky Stepan Zimin are dancing boogie woogie. Sasha is wearing a red mini dress and Stepan with his shaved head is wearing black baggy pants, grey shirt and black vest. «When we saw Stepa, we always smiled, because he was not just big, fat and bold, but big, fat, bold and extremely kind», says Sasha.

They became dance partners back in February and started to spend a lot of time together too. «We performed in the Russian Boogie Woogie Championship, got to the final and then became great friends. I found out a lot about him. It turns out, that he was restoring historical costumes and studying culture and the way of life of Slavic tribes in the Xth century. He was working as a blacksmith, studying politology, he was an accomplished researcher of Eastern studies and knew Arabic well.»

They spent a lot of time together and saw each other every day. They did not talk about demonstrations. Sasha was skeptical about the protest movement: «I went to the Chistye Prudy, but I thought it was all pointless. I had more interesting things to do, than demonstrations.» Stepan did not hide the fact that he was an anarchist, he was saying that he was for «freedom, equality and fraternity».

Sasha was not in Moscow on May 6th. She did not know what Stepan was doing: «I do not think anybody knows that, except for those who were right next to him. I saw pictures with police clashes. But I have not seen it and I do not believe, that Stepan could throw stones.»

She has found out about Stepn's arrest from the social network site vkontakte.ru: «My classmate sent me a link from Vladimir Markin about Stepan's arrest. It felt like it was not happening to me, last time we saw each other on June 7th and on the 8th he was arrested.»

On the seventh they went for a walk together and promised to meet the next day. They had plans for the holidays, to go away for the long weekend with some friends.

They did not go away.

Vasiliy Kushnir, Zimin's lawyer, says that the police have found a mask and a bottle with 100 grams of acetone in Stepan's apartment. Kushnir claims that there is no proof of Stepan's guilt. «There is the protocol of the first questioning of policeman Uvatov. It says: «When we started arresting people, they started throwing stones, bottles and pieces of asphalt towards us. The most active throwers were wearing ski masks, so we did not see their faces.» A month later there was the second questioning of Uvatov and he gave a completely different account. He pointed out someone, who was taller than medium height in a mask.»

Stepan is about two meters high and during the demonstration he was indeed wearing a mask, like all anarchists. He was immediately arrested. Lawyer Kushnir thinks that «the policeman lied. There are only two photographs in the case file, showing how Stepan was arrested. He did not have any stones in his hands.»

Sasha Kunko thinks that Stepan does not deserve an arrest, but only friendship and adoration. «His desire to go to demonstrations is just a youth maximalism. He fought for his ideals and did not commit any crime for which he deserves this. He is not a criminal, he is just a 20 year old student with strong opinions.»

As for now Sasha is preparing a parcel for Stepan and would like the whole situation «to be over and to pass like a bad dream.»

Such parcels, containing loose tea, cold cuts, chocolate candy, are being prepared now in all thirteen families. Every family thinks that their relative could not have been an instigator, could not have called for riots and absolutely could not have organized them in advance. Yes, they were defending themselves and those around them, yes, they were in a crowd, they were agitated and they fought.

On any video of that day one can see that a considerable part of the protestors were defending themselves and attacking too. Those, who were on the front lines, were arrested. No one who was commanding the special forces was charged with exceeding their commission. But thirteen people were arrested. And unfortunately nobody cares about them much. Three are being defended by public organization «Rosuznik», two by «Agora», one by «Public Verdict», and some do not have defending lawyers.

I am no investigator and can only convene my subjective feelings. I have been asking about the detainees their lawyers, friends, wives and girlfriends. The detainees did not seem to me to be neither provocateurs, nor the organizers of the riots. But instead, I got a feeling that any protestor could have been in their place, no mater their political views or level of activity. Somebody «got enraged», somebody «went with the crowd». Or was just standing there. Or even was not standing there.

I also got a feeling that those detainees were just the pawns in somebody's not very subtle game. Because through the lawyers and public defenders we already know that the detainees are visited daily by the operatives and investigators. They keep asking for evidence against the well known opposition leaders. Just that and nothing else.

And nobody knows, when this nightmare is going to end.

Original Russian version published on BG.Ru 20/06/12 (c) Svetlana Reiter, BG.Ru

UPDATE by OVD-Info:

On the 9th of July the Memorial Society determined the case of the Bolotnaya Square riots as politically motivated and recognized the arrested people as political prisoners*.

On the 20th of June Alexander Kamensky was released under a recognizance not to leave the city. On the 9th of August Rikhard Sobolev and Oleg Arkhipenkov were released under a recognizance not to leave the city. Оn the 26th of July two more people were arrested - human rights activist Nikolai Kavkazsky and anarch activist Alexei Polikhovich. As for now 16 people are defendants in the case of the Bolotnaya Square riots, including anarch activist Alexandra Duhanina, 18, who is under house arrest, and civil activist Maria Baronova, 28, who is facing charges of calling for riots and is under a recognizance not to leave the city.

*) The question of recognizing M. Luzyanin as a political prisoner is not raised by Memorial because of his admission of guilt, lack of information about the case and also because M. Luzyanin himself does not wish to be labeled as political prisoner.On July 9 Memorial Society determined the Bolotnaya Square riots case as a political motivated, and recognized the arrested people as political prisoners*.

On June 20 Alexander Kamensky was released under a recognizance not to leave the city. On August 9 Rikhard Sobolev and Oleg Arkhipenkov were released under a recognizance not to leave the city. Оn July 26 two more people were arrested - human rights activist Nikolai Kavkazsky and anarch activist Alexei Polikhovich. As for now 16 people are defendants in the Bolotnaya Square riots case, including anarch activist Alexandra Duhanina, 18, who is under house arrest, and civil activist Maria Baronova, 28, who is facing charges of calling for riots and is under a recognizance not to leave the city.

*) The question of recognizing M. Luzyanina as a political prisoner not raised by Memorial because of his admission of guilt, lack of information about the case and by own wish of M.Luzyanin not to be labeled as political prisoner.