Demonstrations at the Kremlin wall
Arrests following anti-war protests in Moscow
February 3, 2024, 4:41 p.m
They won’t let themselves be defeated: wives of Russian soldiers are increasingly organizing to demonstrate against their husbands’ deployment to the front. Their new action takes place next to the Kremlin. The police led away dozens of participants, mainly journalists.
According to the media, police arrested dozens of people during protests in Moscow by the wives of Russians mobilized for the war in Ukraine. 27 people who were taken away from Manege Square in front of the Kremlin were transferred to the nearest police station, the independent Russian news portal Sota reported. The demonstration was observed by journalists – at least 20 of whom were arrested and later released, including an AFP video reporter.
The AFP journalist was forced into a police car with about 20 other Russian and foreign journalists. The AFP video journalist reported from the moving vehicle that he was apparently on his way to a police station. Video footage showed police taking the journalists, who were wearing yellow vests with the inscription “Press,” into police cars. The journalists were later released.
According to the AFP journalist, around 40 people took part in the protest. A live stream published online by the protest participants showed the women marching together through the center of Moscow. “We are here as the women who need their men,” said one of the women in the livestream. The women would “get creative” if the authorities tried to crush their protests.
Women want to force their men to be brought back from the front
The protest was called for by the “Putj domoi” (“Way Home”) movement, which was founded by the wives of mobilized Russians. On the 500th day of mobilization for the war against Ukraine ordered by Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin, relatives laid flowers on the Kremlin wall at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is a special form of war memorial that commemorates the unidentifiable fallen soldiers in wars. With the peaceful protest, the women want to force their men to be brought back from the front and to refrain from further mobilization.
While criminals recruited for the war are now free and back in Russia, those mobilized are not being allowed to return, they complained. At the event, the activists spoke out for peace as quickly as possible. After the war began, Putin promised his own compatriots that only volunteers would be sent to fight in the neighboring country. In the fall of 2022, after a series of defeats, he called for a partial mobilization of 300,000 men, contrary to his promise.
The soldiers’ wives organized a similar protest at the beginning of January. At that time, among other things, they protested against the continued deployment of their men by laying flowers at military cemeteries. “Our president has declared 2024 the year of the family, but our families, namely those of those mobilized, probably do not count as citizens of Russia,” Sota quoted the complaint from one of those involved.
While the authorities have increasingly taken action against dissidents since the Russian offensive in Ukraine began in February 2022, the police have not yet intervened in the women’s protests. The initiative is extremely sensitive for the authorities – they apparently want to avoid further unrest by arresting women.