VLADIMIR PUTIN won his first presidential election on March 26th 2000. Exactly 17 years later, tens of thousands of Russians across the country came out to protest the corruption that has come to define his tenure. The demonstrations, the most significant challenge to Mr Putin’s regime since 2012, began on Russia’s Pacific coast, where hundreds marched through Vladivostok. Throughout the day reports of rallies, most of them unsanctioned, flowed in from dozens of cities, including metropolises like Novosibirsk and Yekaterinburg, industrial centres like Chelyabinsk and Nizhny Tagil, and even Makhachkala, capital of Dagestan, a North Caucasian region where Mr Putin regularly receives more than 90% of the vote. The largest crowds emerged in Moscow and in St Petersburg, where they spilled onto Palace Square—an echo of the 1917 Russian revolution that is unlikely to be lost on the Kremlin.
The Sunday marches came in response to a call from Aleksei Navalny, an opposition leader and anti-corruption campaigner. Mr Navalny recently released a film alleging that Dmitry Medvedev, the prime minister, has used charities and shell companies to amass a collection of mansions, yachts...Continue reading
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