Putin (pension) Reforms Greeted by Street Protests Across Russia

[Chicago Democrat]

Putin Reforms Greeted by Street Protests Across Russia
By STEVEN LEE MYERS

Published: January 16, 2005


HIMKI, Russia, Jan. 15 - Mikhail I. Yermakov, a retired engineer, has never before taken to the streets to protest - not when the Soviet Union collapsed, the wars in Chechnya began, the ruble plummeted in 1998 or President Vladimir V. Putin last year ended his right to choose his governor.


On Saturday, however, he joined hundreds of others in the central square of this gritty industrial city on the edge of Moscow in the latest of a weeklong wave of protests across Russia against a new law abolishing a wide range of social benefits for the country's 32 million pensioners, veterans and people with disabilities.

Demonstrations were held in at least three other cities in the Moscow region, in the capital of Tatarstan and, for the fourth straight day, in Samara in central Russia. In St. Petersburg, several thousand demonstrators blocked the city's main boulevard, with some calling for Mr. Putin's resignation.

Taken together, the protests are the largest and most passionate since Mr. Putin came to power in 2000. They appear to have tapped into latent discontent with Mr. Putin's government and the party that dominates Parliament, United Russia.

"It is spontaneous, and this is the most dangerous thing for the authorities," Mr. Yermakov, 67, said, as speakers denounced the government from a step beneath a hulking bust of Lenin. "It is a tsunami, and United Russia does not understand that it is going to hit them....


Rest at...

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/16/international/europe/16moscow.html?hp&ex=1105851600&en=b24fb953dc739959&ei=5094&partner=homepage

[Nite Owl]

1. What was that quote from *

when they met about looking into his eyes? They are soulmates those two.

[Lizzie Borden]

2. Yes. No wonder...

Bush sees something he likes in Putin's eyes, his own reflection.

[lovuian]

3. Russia has all this oil and not one drop will trickle to the poor

people of Russia!!! They need to storm the Kremlin!!!

[mtnester]

4. And here many of us sit

Election fraud in the Ukraine? They took to the streets

Threaten their pension in Russia? They take to the streets

Election fraud and screwing with our pension in the good ole USA? No significant reaction from the couch potato nation.

My feet are worn to the bone folks, everyone else needs to get up and move!

[TahitiNut]

5. We spend more on our military than we do on Social Security (OASI).

How's that for priorities? Both are at about $400B/year ... with the military leading the way. (Total OASI benefits for 2003 were $399B.)

But even more appalling, we spent over $260B in 2003 on just the interest on the national debt ... just so Smirk's and Sneer's wealthy cronies don't have to pay a fair share of taxes.

[sweetheart]

6. social security reform, russian style

Just dump 'em in the street... good job putin... can't afford a
criminal war in chechnya AND taking care of your own people, eh?

Putin's a chicken shit.