Russian MP Roughed Up in Moscow Rally Permit Scuffle

A Just Russia State Duma Deputy Ilya Ponomarev has requested an investigation be conducted into a scuffle between police and opposition members waiting in line at the Moscow Mayor’s Office Feb. 20.

Opposition representatives jockeyed with pro-Kremlin activists as both hoped to obtain a permit to hold a rally on the same day in the same place – March 5 on Lyublyanskaya Square. Although opposition activists said they had been waiting in line since long before the pro-Kremlin groups arrived to the building, the Moscow Mayor’s Office served the latter’s requests first.

Ponomarev said in a youtube video, that he was trying to get into the office through a window when about 15 members of a pro-Kremlin group led by Public Chamber member Maxim Mishchenko approached him.

"It was clear that they had been let in by the mayor's office officials through a back entrance," Ponomarev said in the video.

Ponomarev said that Mishchenko’s entourage began dragging him away from the window and where aided by riot police officers, who threatened to beat him. According to The Moscow Times, another riot police officer attacked opposition activist Nadezhda Mityushkina and tried to rip up her passport when she approached the window.

Ponomarev’s lawyer, Nikolay Polozov, said he filed a claim with the Moscow’s Tverskoye police department on Feb. 21.

The police used force against Ponomarev, Polozov said, and caused him moral and material damage by tearing his clothes and shoes.

“Ponomarev has undergone a medical checkup and its report has been included in the claim,” Polozov said.