Troops on Moscow streets as tensions flare

Truckloads of soldiers poured into Moscow as tensions flared over Sunday’s flawed parliamentary elections, and a government spokesman warned opposition protesters not to take to the streets for a second night.

“The actions of those who hold unsanctioned demonstrations must be stopped,” Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for prime minister Vladimir Putin, told journalists.

Russia’s interior ministry insisted the troops, which didn’t appear to include any heavy armour, were a “rotation” of additional police and interior ministry soldiers which had been brought into Moscow before the Sunday elections, and didn’t represent an increase in the overall military presence in the centre of the city.

However, the columns of trucks which rumbled along main thoroughfares and parked in central squares seemed to be an unmistakable show of strength by the Kremlin, concerned that opposition protests could spread.

Mr Putin and his entourage made conciliatory public remarks in the wake of Sunday’s elections, which represented the worst setback of his 12-year rule. The prime minister’s ruling United Russia party fell from 315 to 238 seats in the 450-seat lower house of parliament, despite widespread allegations of electoral fraud by the regime.


 http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/3f482224-2011-11e1-8662-00144feabdc...