Topic: POLITIK - on February 4, 2012 at 4:06:00 PM CET
Protesters Throng Frozen Moscow in Anti-Putin March
Tens of thousands of antigovernment protesters marched on Saturday through this city, gripped by bitter Arctic cold, in a third major effort by Russians opposed to Vladimir V. Putin’s return to the presidency.
A series of similar actions in December shocked the Russian establishment with their size and giddy, infectious mood, as a famously passive part of the electorate coalesced into huge crowds that chanted “Putin, go away” and “We exist.” But the momentum seemed to dissipate in January, as opposition factions squabbled and Mr. Putin’s victory in the March 4 election began to appear imminent and certain.
Then, of course, there was the weather — at noon the sun was a remote white disk above the horizon, and the temperature was measured at 20 degrees below zero Celsius, or —4 Fahrenheit.
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