Organizers of last week’s record pro-government rally in western Moscow were fined 1,000 rubles ($33) for exceeding attendance limits at the event.
The event at Poklonnaya Gora memorial park on February 4 was booked for 15,000, but city police said 140,000 showed up. An independent geodesic estimate by Moskovskie Novosti put the figure at 80,000.
The fine is to be paid by one of the organizers, Nadezhda Korneyeva of the minor Patriots of Russia party. Korneyeva pleaded guilty, prompting a local magistrate to slash the fine from the maximum of 2,000 rubles.
Prime Minister and presidential candidate Vladimir Putin, who was widely praised at the rally, said last week that he would “partially” chip in on the fine. He did not comment on Friday.
A new rally in Putin’s support was announced for February 23 in central Moscow. Organizers said 200,000 would attend.
Meanwhile, another co-organizer of the last rally, political analyst Sergei Kurginyan, said he would not participate in a pro-Putin event and hold his own gathering on February 23. The venue was not set Friday.
The pro-government rallies are a reaction to a string of mass opposition protests that followed the questioned parliamentary elections in December. The most recent event, also held on February 4, gathered some 62,000, according to the geodesic estimate.
