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Police Raid National Bolshevik's Apartment

Police raided the apartment of an activist with the banned National Bolshevik Party on Thursday and confiscated a computer and several books by opposition leader Eduard Limonov, a spokesman for the opposition coalition The Other Russia said.

Police entered the apartment of activist Maxim Gasovich in southern Moscow at around 9 a.m. in search of fellow opposition activist Darya Isayeva, who is being investigated on suspicion of extremism for a stunt in a Yolki-Palki restaurant last month, spokesman Alexander Averin said.

On July 29, a group of National Bolsheviks refused to pay a 1,500 ruble ($63) bill at a Yolki-Palki outlet, instead leaving leaflets that read, "Eat for free!" The stunt, they said, was a protest of rising food prices.

Police detained two of the activists, while Isayeva was released later that evening, Averin said. Failing to find Isayeva on Thursday, police seized Gasovich's computer and several books authored by Limonov, he said.

"Why the police chose to raid Gasovich's apartment in pursuit of Isayeva more than a week after the Yolki-Palki incident is unclear," Averin said. Averin said the officers were from city police's criminal investigations department, though Vadim Kolesnik, a spokesman for the department, denied the claim.

Such a raid would likely have been conducted by the anti-organized crime department, he said. Calls to the department went unanswered Thursday.

Limonov said it was laughable that his books were confiscated from Gasovich's apartment. "These are published books," he said. "Only uneducated cops would think they could be used as evidence against us."

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