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After the elections, attempts were made to organise rallies against falsifications in several Russian cities. In Moscow, the organisers of the rally “For Fair Elections” were refused permission due to the current “coronavirus restrictions,” reports RusNews, citing activist Vladimir Stepanov.
“And this is in 2026. In a city where street concerts, religious processions for tens of thousands of people and other large events are held without issue. I think this is the highest degree of cynicism and hypocrisy,” said Stepanov.
In Tyumen, a major city in Western Siberia, blogger and dubbing actress Kristina Nekrasova planned to hold a rally against falsifications, reports '7×7—Horizontal Russia'. In response to her notification about the event, she received a letter from city hall, but the document did not contain an official decision.
Later, a local police officer visited Nekrasova and asked her to sign a warning about the responsibility for holding an unsanctioned event. According to the blogger, the police officer also unofficially said the rally had not been approved. After this, Nekrasova decided not to submit another notification and urged people not to come to the rally.
Applications for rallies were also submitted in Moscow, St Petersburg, Perm (in the Urals), Izhevsk (in the Urals region), Kazan (Tatarstan), Ulan-Ude (eastern Siberia), Yekaterinburg (in the Urals), Krasnodar (southern Russia), and Lipetsk (western Russia). In St Petersburg, Perm and Kazan, the rallies were not approved, '7×7' clarifies.
In Sokolniki in Moscow, a young man named Kirill held a solo protest with a placard reading: “Fair elections. No falsifications! Discrediting democracy is criminal!”
“About 10–15 people came right up to me and said I was doing the right thing, that this is necessary. <…> Most memorable—a guy from a nearby café came out and gave me coffee as a sign of solidarity. Also, an elderly woman came over and gave me a tight hug,” Kirill told RusNews.
About 40 minutes later, Kirill was detained. According to him, at the police station they “tried to scare” him, put him in the database, but let him go without drawing up a protocol.
“When I was being detained, another elderly woman intervened and pleaded with them to release me. The security guards they’d originally sent after me were also asking for me to be let go. While they were leading me aside and we were waiting for their chief, the guards in general said they didn’t support any of this [the falsifications, the detentions], but they just couldn’t disobey,” the young man said.