MOSCOW, October 31 (RAPSI) – The Moscow City Court will consider appeals filed by organizers of unauthorized rallies in central Moscow against a ruling on recovery of 1.2 million rubles (about $20,000) from them in favor of the city’s public transport authority Mosgortrans on November 29, RAPSI reports from the courtroom.
The court gave the defendants time to examine case papers and prepare their arguments against the ruling of Moscow’s Koptevsky District Court of September 10 ordering Alexey Navalny, Ilya Yashin, Ivan Zhdanov, Yulia Galyamina, Georgy Alburov, Lyubov Sobol and two other defendants to pay the compensation to Mosgortrans.
In its suit Moscow’s public transport authority said that on July 27, an unauthorized rally led to the public transport traffic delay and truck detention time.
The defendants in turn objected the claim arguing that they had not called rally participants to divert traffic.
There are several similar lawsuits against the opposition figures in Moscow courts.
On November 14, the Simonovsky District Court will hear three claims totaling to nearly 4 million rubles (over $60,000) against Sobol and Alburov filed by the Moscow Metro state entity, the city’s public transport authority Mosgortrans and Autoroads state-financed entity. Moscow Metro seeks for 272,000 rubles, Mosgortrans demands 657,000 rubles and Autoroads sues the opposition figures for more than 3 million rubles.
The court is to hear a claim by the Interior Ministry against the organizers of unauthorized summer rallies. The demands are totaling to about 9.7 million rubles (slightly over $152,000 at the current exchange rate); the ministry says the sum is its expenditures for security measures stepped up during the unauthorized rallies in Moscow this summer.
The Cheremushkinsky District Court has scheduled a Moscow prosecutor’s office lawsuit to collect about 5 million rubles from the defendants for November 19.
Moreover, on October 1, the Tushinsky District Court collected over 240,000 rubles ($3,700) from organizers of unauthorized rallies in central Moscow in favor of the restaurant Armenia. The court granted the claim in part. The plaintiff demanded to recover 551,847 rubles.
Also, in early October, the Koptevsky District Court ordered recovery of nearly 3.5 million rubles from the opposition politicians for trampling grassplots down.
Protest actions began in Moscow in mid-July after election commissions denied registration of certain opposition members as candidates for the Moscow City Duma elections reasoning that documents submitted by them contained numerous violations.
The first unauthorized rally took place hear the Moscow City Election Commission’s building on July 14 and looked like a provocation, according to law experts.
Unauthorized rallies in support of candidates seeking to become lawmakers of the Moscow State Duma but refused registration by the Election Commission were also held on July 27 and August 3 in central Moscow. Over 1,000 people were arrested for various violations as a result.
