Russia region witnesses rise in protests for imprisoned activists

At least 10 people have been arrested after many protesters gathered in the capital of Russia’s Bashkortostan republic to support jailed rights activist Fail Alsynov.

A video from a news outlet called Sota Vision showed police moving protesters in the city of Ufa.

This was the third protest this week to support Alsynov. It was the first one in the capital of the region.

On Wednesday, he was told he has to spend four years in a prison far away from home.

He said he did not encourage hate against migrant workers and that his words were not translated well into Russian.

Around 1,500 people gathered in Ufa on Friday, even though authorities had warned them not to protest.

The leader of Bashkortostan, Radiy Khabirov, said he would show the real intentions of the protesters and accused them of trying to cause trouble and getting support from other countries.

Recordings showed police standing in Salavat Yulaev square in the middle of the city and directing protesters to leave.

In another part of the video, the crowd was fighting with the police when they took a protest sign from a woman who was being taken away by the police.

The protests started two days ago in Baymak, near the Mongolian border, because Fail Alsynov was sentenced to four years in jail.

Many people marched in a small town, about 400km from the regional capital, to show their anger. It was one of the largest protests since Russia invaded Ukraine nearly two years ago.

Police reportedly used tear gas and batons on protesters, and protesters were seen throwing snowballs back at the police.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said the protests were just a few isolated events and that it’s up to local officials to deal with them.

The police are looking into the people who were protesting in Baymak. They are being charged with “mass rioting,” which can lead to up to 15 years in jail.

Singer Altynai Valitov was visited by local authorities in Ufa because he asked people on Instagram to protest in Bashkortostan and other parts of Russia.

Fail Alsynov was found guilty of being mean to people who moved here, at a protest against digging for gold. But his friends say it’s payback for him stopping soda mining in a special spot to the people who live here.

He called people from Central Asia and the Caucasus region “black people”, which is a mean word in Russia. These people make up most of Russia’s migrant population.

However, he keeps saying that the words he used in the Bashkir language actually mean “poor people” and were translated incorrectly into Russian. He plans to ask for a different decision.

Alsynov previously criticized military gathering in the region as a “genocide” of the Bashkir people, who are closely related to the Tatars and live in the southern Ural mountains.

There are people saying that a lot of ethnic minorities in Russia are being sent to fight in Ukraine.

Alsynov was the leader of a group called Bashkort, which wanted to protect the culture of the Bashkirs. But in 2020, the government said it was too extreme and banned it.
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