Two bikini-clad animal rights activists on Tuesday locked themselves in a cage across the street from a Rostik's-KFC restaurant on Triumfalnaya Ploshchad to protest what they said was inhumane treatment of chickens by fast food chain KFC.

Signs in English and Russian next to the cage read, "KFC tortures chicks," while a half-dozen protesters held signs that read, "Boycott KFC" and "KFC Cruelty."

Rostik's became KFC's Russian partner last summer.

One of the protesters from the group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, Jodi Ruckley, traveled to Moscow from Britain for the protest.

"It's a bit colder here," said Ruckley, dressed in a yellow bikini as she peeked out of the cage. In other respects, the Moscow protest was the same as other PETA events across Europe, she said.

U.S.-based PETA and Russia's Alliance for the Protection of Animals hoped to draw attention to the practices of KFC's suppliers, which the group said include forcing live chickens into tanks of scalding-hot water.

KFC's spokeswoman Laurie Schalow denied the allegations. "KFC is committed to the well-being and humane treatment of chickens," she said by e-mail.

Rostik Restaurants, which operates the chain of Rostik's-KFC eateries, said it was unaffected by the protest. "I hope that Russian consumers have gotten used to black PR long ago," Rostik's spokeswoman Valeria Silina said. "We only use local suppliers," whose practices had not changed in years, she said.

Passersby seemed unmoved by the protest. "Who paid for this? McDonald's?" quipped a young man.

Authorities had allowed no more than eight participants at the protest, said Yelena Surovikina of the Alliance for the Protection of Animals. "If people eat chicken, they are being cruel. If they eat KFC chicken, they are being doubly cruel," said Surovikina, a vegetarian.

Ruckley's companion in the cage, Inessa Samkova, said she believed the protest would influence KFC's practices. Taking her clothes off for a PETA protest outside of a Benetton store in Moscow last summer had helped to convince the clothes chain to change its wool suppliers, she said.