Dissenters' March: temperature rising

Veronika Vinogradova, an activist of the organization pompously titled the Vanguard of the Communist Youth (AKM, sic! I find it hard to believe, but young communists also suffer from violations of human rights...) was detained by unknown men who did not introduce themselves and gave no explanations. As a matter of fact, she was kidnapped from the hostel of the Samara Aerospace University. She was pushed into a car and her current location is unknown. Her friends who tried to stop these men, were beaten.

Three people who were detained yesterday (Yuri Chervinchuk, Anastasia Kurt-Adzhiyeva and her father Sergey Kurt-Adzhiyev) were released today after the personal plea of the city mayor Victor Tarkhov. No charges were brought against them.

Leaders of two most respectable (IMHO) human rights defense groups in Russia, including Lyudmila Alexeyeva of the Helsinki Watch Group and Lev Ponomaryov of the movement "For the human rights" arrived to Samara.

Also, it was announced today that two of the leaders of the coalition of the opposition known as "The Other Russia", Garry Kasparov and Eduard Limonov, will attempt to arrive to Samara and participate in the march on May 18.

Garry Kasparov said today that the scale of the repressions against the organizers of the Samara rally exceeds what they had to face in Moscow one month ago. The Moscow activists decided to launch a picket at the building of the Ministry of the Home Affairs demanding to stop the prosecutions of the opposition in Samara.