... correspondent Miriam Elder tweets: “There is some blood and tear gas and now people setting up tents.” State Duma deputy Ilya Ponomaryov tweeted that Bolotnaya Ploshchad is still filled with people and that he is standing in the area with Solidarity leader Ilya Yashin. 7:02 p.m., Opposition Demonstrators Staying Put Around Bolotnaya Ploshchad: An update from Moscow Times reporter Rachel Nielsen, standing on the southern embankment across from Bolotnaya Ploshchad: “Riot police with...

... attack that temporarily shut down the president's official website Wednesday. The site, Kremlin.ru, was unavailable for nearly an hour beginning at 11 a.m. The hacker group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, claiming it was done in solidarity with the opposition, Interfax reported. A representative of the Kremlin's internet service confirmed the attack and said that other government sites had experienced attacks as well, Interfax reported. "We are very serious about these...

... massive and unprecedentedly violent demonstration on Bolotnaya Ploshchad and continuing in a smaller, peripatetic protest that moves from square to square to avoid detentions by ever-present police. Their appearance on Wednesday could signal growing solidarity between the protest movement and the Communist Party, the country's most powerful political force after the pro-Kremlin United Russia. Left-wing forces are prominent in the opposition movement. One of its most visible leaders, Sergei Udaltsov...

... rubles ($32,000), but later raised the figure to 20.4 million ($660,000), Interfax reported. Opposition figures criticized the numbers, presenting information that showed the costs were inflated. "This sum can only be called bewildering," Solidarity activist Ilya Yashin told Kommersant. "It must be some kind of golden grass." Echo Moskvy editor Alexei Venediktov wrote on Twitter that the most expensive grass available costs only 220 rubles per square meter, and taking into account...

... were able to quickly organize new toilets from another company. "The authorities are funny: they removed the toilets to kick us out of Chistiye Prudy. However, we were able to solve the problem quickly: after an hour they brought new ones," Solidarity opposition group co-leader Ilya Yashin said in Twitter. At least 150 protesters made it through the entire night with sandwiches, tea and coffee, waking up to morning exercises and a clean-up of the territory, Interfax reported. A bulletin...

... will be free of slogans and signs and don’t require a city permit, organizers said. Meanwhile, the activist hacker group Anonymous announced plans to attack the website of the prime minister on Sunday and of the government on Monday in a show of solidarity with the opposition. In comments attached to an ominous YouTube video denouncing Putin, the activists called on supporters to participate in the denial-of-service attacks. 418973 179742

... including those for salaries, which she said is against the law. Volkova said the firm has resubmitted the necessary documents, but it was unclear how long it would take to unfreeze its accounts. In another development, Roman Dobrokhotov, a member of the Solidarity opposition movement, has announced a mock public prayer in support of Pussy Riot and against Putin starting at 2 p.m. Sunday at Christ the Savior Cathedral. Dobrokhotov said band members face criminal charges "only for praying not according...

... “reasonable.” About 200 protesters remained in the Chistiye Prudy neighborhood Thursday afternoon, and the riot police who had been disrupting their mobile protests for the past week were gone, opposition activist Danila Lindele said on Twitter. Solidarity opposition group co-leader Ilya Yashin and socialite Ksenia Sobchak visited the crowd to encourage them and discuss their next steps. Meanwhile, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, speaking at an Open Government meeting, broke his silence about...

... turned up at the Chistiye Prudy sit-in with her hair elaborately curled for filming "Gosdep-2" and wearing a very expensive-looking leather jacket. It's fair to say that there's a lot of talk about her relationship with Ilya Yashin of the Solidarity movement, with the two even appearing in matching his-and-her's striped tops at Chistiye Prudy. There's a definite romance for an uptown girl like Sobchak to hang out with a man who regularly gets banged up for 15 days. But you do wonder what...

... Malakhov and Sobchak, two other pillars of Russian showbiz have been announced as co-hosts for the Muz-TV awards: Maxim Galkin and Lera Kudryavtseva. It is not difficult to imagine the anguish they must be experiencing, torn between a desire to show solidarity with their colleagues and the duty to fulfill paid contractual obligations. A liberal who supports the anti-Putin movement might say, "This bloody regime has once again shown its beastly nature and love of censorship." A leftist radical...

... in a friendly, engaging manner, repeatedly asked passersby, "Would you like to take a seat on the throne?" "Try out my throne of power if you like!" Everybody laughed in response to his invitations. Was this an artist's moment of solidarity with President Putin, who now finds himself in the position of metaphorically occupying a seat like this for another six or twelve years? Or was it an attempt to ridicule anyone silly enough to put himself in a position like that? I don't have...

... detention. The police were able to dismantle the Kitai-Gorod camp, but it immediately popped up again at Chistiye Prudy by the statue of Kazakh poet Abai Qunanbayuli. The choice of venue was purely practical: The headquarters of the opposition movement Solidarity is close, giving the protesters access to hot coffee and tea. Within just a few hours, news of the event — already dubbed #OccupyAbai — had spread and was drawing participants. The camp quickly became a "democracy preserve...

... speaking in a friendly, engaging manner, repeatedly asked passersby, "Would like to take a seat on the throne?" "Try out my throne of power if you like!" Everybody laughed in response to his invitations. Was this an artist's moment of solidarity with Putin, who now finds himself in the position of metaphorically occupying a seat like this for another six or 12 years? Or was it an attempt to ridicule anyone silly enough to put himself in a position like that? I don't have the answer...

... Putin’s May 7 inauguration. The two were sentenced to 15 days in jail each after being arrested on the night of May 8-9 during one of the so-called “people’s strolls” and charged with disobeying police orders. Another opposition leader, Solidarity’s Ilya Yashin, is scheduled to be released from prison on May 27 after having served a 10-day term. Udaltsov was released shortly after midnight and Navalny about 10 hours later. After his release, Udaltsov set out for the current location...

... the young cannot slip money to their college admissions officers and professors to gain admittance and graduate with honors. In speeches, opposition leaders might talk less about freedom — important as it is — and more about fairness and solidarity. Instead of concentrating on a few big cities, they might focus their campaign on the hundreds of grassroots cases of community activism in which ordinary people band together to fight forest fires, protest a corrupt police chief or block an...

... both oversaw national projects as first deputy prime ministers. Their yearlong “race” ended in December of that year when Putin named Medvedev as his chosen successor. Andrei Piontkovsky, a veteran political analyst and senior member of the Solidarity opposition movement, had little sympathy for Medvedev, calling him a “totally demolished figure.” Medvedev’s main function was to delay the current protest movement “because everybody was hoping that he would improve...

... south end of Ulitsa Bolshaya Yakimanka. Also on hand were opposition leaders Udaltsov, Navalny, Boris Nemtsov, and Yevgenia Chirikova, as well as contingents of nationalist activists and activists from liberal and leftist political groups, including the Solidarity movement, the Communist Party, and the Yabloko party. But a shift in atmosphere was apparent in part from demonstrators’ signs, which bore fewer creative messages than at past opposition events. One man held a sign with the direct message:...

... relative youth and aggressive slogans, prompting curious looks from marchers with the mainstream Communists. Police estimated the entire crowd at 3,500, according to a statement on the official website. Their appearance on Wednesday could signal growing solidarity between the protest movement and the Communist Party, the country's most powerful political force after the pro-Kremlin United Russia. Left-wing forces are prominent in the opposition movement. One of its most visible leaders, Udaltsov, is...