Translated material
"Freedom March" has not been officially agreed upon
The opposition received an official refusal from the Moscow mayor's office to approve the Freedom March action on December 15, the organizing committee of the action reported.
“The applicants for the action on December 15 have just received an official refusal from the mayor’s office to approve the action,” said a representative of the organizing committee. He noted that the authorities warned the organizers “about the inadmissibility of holding an uncoordinated action.”
“Thus, the march on December 15 has not been officially approved. The organizers do not intend to hold any unauthorized actions,” the agency’s interlocutor said.
The other day it became known that the Moscow mayor's office and the opposition could not agree on the route of the procession on December 15. “None of the areas we proposed are considered as the end point of the March. They cite the impossibility of blocking roads,” Sergei Udaltsov wrote on December 11 in his microblog on Twitter.
The mayor's office invited Protestants to walk from Pushkinskaya Square to Sakharov Avenue. But the oppositionists insisted that the Freedom March end on one of the squares in the center of Moscow. “If ... the mayor’s office does not change its position, then the March will not be agreed upon. Then the word is up to the people,” Udaltsov said .
On December 11, eminent oppositionists, one after another, confirmed that even if the action was not agreed upon, they would come to the Lubyanka.
“On December 15, at 15:00, we will peacefully and calmly go to Lubyanka Square along any of the 146 possible routes,” Alexei Navalny wrote on his Twitter.
“On December 15, I will also go for a walk on Lubyanka Square. I’ll start at 15:00. #FreedomMarch,” said State Duma deputy Dmitry Gudkov.
“Personally, on December 15, I will go for a walk on Lubyanka Square. Peacefully and without weapons. What are your plans? :),” Ilya Yashin addressed his subscribers.
Initially, the organizers of the Freedom March proposed a route option from Pushkinskaya to Lubyanka Square via the boulevards, Myasnitskaya Street, Lubyanka and Lubyansky Proezd, but representatives of the mayor’s office refused to approve this route, insisting on the option from Pushkinskaya Square to Sakharov Avenue.