MOSCOW (BLOOMBERG, REUTERS) - Supporters of imprisoned Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny staged a Valentine's Day flashmob protest on Sunday (Feb 14) by waving lights as a symbol of discontent with the authorities that have waged a harsh crackdown on street rallies.
A top Navalny aide, Leonid Volkov, had urged supporters to go out into the yards of apartment buildings at 8pm on Sunday and hold up phone flashlights or other lights for a few minutes, after announcing that the opposition was suspending further street rallies until spring.
"Putin made fear his sole weapon," Mr Volkov said. "We have to overcome this fear. We have to carry out a protest action that riot police can't stop and that anyone can join."
This was despite a warning by the authorities that protesters could be arrested.
Mr Navalny's allies have declared a moratorium on street rallies until the spring after police detained thousands of people at protests in the past few weeks against the opposition politician's arrest and imprisonment.
President Vladimir Putin said he can understand why people support the recent rallies, according to his meeting with the chief editors of major media outlets broadcast on state television on Sunday.
"Irritation is growing, there are many problems, there is not enough money," Mr Putin said. He referred to Navalny only as a "figure" that was being used by Europe, the United States and other countries to destabilise Russia.
The flashmob, which organisers call "Love is more powerful than fear," started in the Russian Far East, Mr Volkov said in his Twitter post, showing a photo of a group of people with the lights on the Bering Island.
Mr Navalny's team accounts posted similar photos from Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky and other Far East regions.
Mr Navalny himself only posted a photo with his wife, Yulia, on Instagram, with the message: "I love you. And all the jokes I make in the courts, I make only for you to laugh in the first row."
Russia has 11 time zones, so the event should reach the capital, Moscow, in several hours. The organisers didn't have information on how many people took part in the flashmob so far.
Riot police detained more than 11,000 when protesters took to the streets in dozens of cities on Jan 23 and 31. The largest nationwide protests in a decade came after police detained Mr Navalny when he returned to Moscow last month from Berlin, where he'd been recovering from a nerve-agent poisoning that he and Western governments blamed on Putin's security service. The Kremlin denies responsibility.
The flashmob takes place as the European Union works on a proposal to sanction Russia over the imprisonment of Mr Navalny, according to two people familiar with the discussions. A Moscow court jailed the opposition leader for two years and 8 months on Feb 2 for breaching probation terms from a 2014 fraud conviction while he was recovering in Germany.
Mr Navalny's allies have urged the EU, the UK and the U.S. to sanction 35 top Russian officials and business figures close to the Kremlin. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov warned on Friday that Russia is ready to break off ties with the EU if the bloc imposes sanctions that damage the nation's economy.
