RUSSIA police have raided the Moscow office of opposition leader Alexei Navalny as demonstrations calling for a boycott of Russia’s presidential election take place across the country.
A video stream this morning from Navalny’s headquarters showed police entering the office.
One broadcaster on the stream said police apparently were using a grinder to try to get access to the broadcast studio.
The anchors said police said they had come because of a bomb threat.
Navalny, who has been blocked from running in Russia’s March 18 presidential election, called for nationwide protests today.
Video footage posted on social media showed Navalny appear on Moscow’s main thoroughfare, Tverskaya Street, a few hundred metres from the Kremlin, to join several hundred supporters taking part in the protest, which the authorities had said was illegal.
Navalny has little chance of influencing the election, likely to be won comfortably by President Vladimir Putin, but his ability to use social media to mobilise crowds of mostly young protesters in major cities has irked the Kremlin.
The numbers who showed up at protests across Russia today – some shouting “Putin is a thief” — were lower than previous demonstrations Navalny had staged, indicating the momentum may have shifted away from him.
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