Police detain a participant during an opposition protest in Moscow March 5, 2012. Russian police detained at least 100 people at protests calling on Vladimir Putin to resign after a presidential election they say was unfairly skewed in his favour.
MOSCOW - Police arrested dozens of Russians Monday as thousands protested at Vladimir Putin's return to the presidency in elections Western monitors called "skewed."
Some 14,000 people according to police turned out in Pushkin Square in central Moscow chanting "Russia Yes! Putin No!" as hundreds of helmeted riot police stood by on guard.
But Moscow police arrested dozens of protesters at a separate unsanctioned event near the central election commission while an AFP reporter saw nearly one hundred detained at an unauthorised meeting in Putin's native St. Petersburg.
Putin won almost 64 per cent of Sunday's ballot in easing his way back to the seat he held for the maqximum two terms from 2000-2008 before his four-year stint as prime minister.
His Communist Party challenger Gennady Zyuganov refused to recognize the results after winning just 17 per cent while the billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov sprang a surprise to finish third despite building his base from scratch.
Election-rigging claims have shadowed these polls just as they had done at parliamentary elections in December that were followed by three months of the biggest anti-Kremlin demonstrations since Soviet times.
Opposition leaders adopted a joint statement at the Pushkin Square rally "demanding an end to political repression, an investigation into massive fraud and early parliamentary and presidential elections."
"Our aim is elections within the year. Otherwise the revolution is inevitable, even if we do not want revolution we want free elections," said Putin's former prime minister turned bitter Kremlin critic Mikhail Kasyanov.
Putin's fans staged their own highly-choreographed rally in front of the Kremlin that the city estimated at 15,000 strong, and which included a call to "protect our victory".
International observers led by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe said that while there had been progress in transparency, the campaign had been massively tilted in Putin's favour and was followed by major irregularities in the vote count.
"Conditions (for the campaign) were clearly skewed in favour of . . . Vladimir Putin" while the vote count was "assessed negatively in almost one-third of polling stations observed due to procedural irregularities," they said.
Russia's independent monitoring group Golos published a report that showed Putin winning less than 51 per cent.
"The Russian elections were neither free nor fair and were not in line with the demands of Russian law and international electoral standards," Golos said.
Europe gave a wary and resigned greeting to Putin's Kremlin comeback.
Britain called his victory "decisive" while noting that the OSCE had "clearly identified some problems". The European Union also urged Russia to address the reported shorcomings.
But German Chancellor Angela Merkel — representing Russia's biggest trading partner in Europe and a critic of Putin in the past — was due to congratulate Putin on Monday evening while France said it had "no doubt" about who won.
The OSCE-led report found "bad or very bad" vote counting procedures in 29 out of 98 observed cases and noted that Putin's experiment with web cameras at polling stations "did not fulfil the expectations".
The opposition had earlier raised concerns about so called "carousel" voting where people cast multiple ballots at different polling stations using absentee voting documents.
Putin said he would soon instruction election officials to "carefully check all the possible violations that were mentioned."
Almost full results showed Putin winning 63.60 per cent of the vote — better than most pre-election forecasts and well ahead of Zyuganov's 17.18 per cent.
The billionaire Prokhorov beet the veteran populist Vladimir Zhirinovsky to third with 7.97 while former upper house speaker Sergei Mironov brought the rear.
Putin will return to the Kremlin for a recently extended six-year mandate at a time of rapid social change in a Russia that is seeing an increasingly critical middle class and an explosion in Internet use.
Source:http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Protests+arrests+mark+Putin+Kremlin+return/6251343/story.html
Some 14,000 people according to police turned out in Pushkin Square in central Moscow chanting "Russia Yes! Putin No!" as hundreds of helmeted riot police stood by on guard.
But Moscow police arrested dozens of protesters at a separate unsanctioned event near the central election commission while an AFP reporter saw nearly one hundred detained at an unauthorised meeting in Putin's native St. Petersburg.
Putin won almost 64 per cent of Sunday's ballot in easing his way back to the seat he held for the maqximum two terms from 2000-2008 before his four-year stint as prime minister.
His Communist Party challenger Gennady Zyuganov refused to recognize the results after winning just 17 per cent while the billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov sprang a surprise to finish third despite building his base from scratch.
Election-rigging claims have shadowed these polls just as they had done at parliamentary elections in December that were followed by three months of the biggest anti-Kremlin demonstrations since Soviet times.
Opposition leaders adopted a joint statement at the Pushkin Square rally "demanding an end to political repression, an investigation into massive fraud and early parliamentary and presidential elections."
"Our aim is elections within the year. Otherwise the revolution is inevitable, even if we do not want revolution we want free elections," said Putin's former prime minister turned bitter Kremlin critic Mikhail Kasyanov.
Putin's fans staged their own highly-choreographed rally in front of the Kremlin that the city estimated at 15,000 strong, and which included a call to "protect our victory".
International observers led by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe said that while there had been progress in transparency, the campaign had been massively tilted in Putin's favour and was followed by major irregularities in the vote count.
"Conditions (for the campaign) were clearly skewed in favour of . . . Vladimir Putin" while the vote count was "assessed negatively in almost one-third of polling stations observed due to procedural irregularities," they said.
Russia's independent monitoring group Golos published a report that showed Putin winning less than 51 per cent.
"The Russian elections were neither free nor fair and were not in line with the demands of Russian law and international electoral standards," Golos said.
Europe gave a wary and resigned greeting to Putin's Kremlin comeback.
Britain called his victory "decisive" while noting that the OSCE had "clearly identified some problems". The European Union also urged Russia to address the reported shorcomings.
But German Chancellor Angela Merkel — representing Russia's biggest trading partner in Europe and a critic of Putin in the past — was due to congratulate Putin on Monday evening while France said it had "no doubt" about who won.
The OSCE-led report found "bad or very bad" vote counting procedures in 29 out of 98 observed cases and noted that Putin's experiment with web cameras at polling stations "did not fulfil the expectations".
The opposition had earlier raised concerns about so called "carousel" voting where people cast multiple ballots at different polling stations using absentee voting documents.
Putin said he would soon instruction election officials to "carefully check all the possible violations that were mentioned."
Almost full results showed Putin winning 63.60 per cent of the vote — better than most pre-election forecasts and well ahead of Zyuganov's 17.18 per cent.
The billionaire Prokhorov beet the veteran populist Vladimir Zhirinovsky to third with 7.97 while former upper house speaker Sergei Mironov brought the rear.
Putin will return to the Kremlin for a recently extended six-year mandate at a time of rapid social change in a Russia that is seeing an increasingly critical middle class and an explosion in Internet use.
Source:http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Protests+arrests+mark+Putin+Kremlin+return/6251343/story.html
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