EU slams 'heavy-handed' Russian activist arrests
(BRUSSELS) - The European Parliament on Monday urged Moscow to stop its "heavy-handed" treatment of protesters, after riot police arrested scores of opposition activists at a rally in Moscow.
"On behalf of the European parliament I have to express my consternation on hearing of the detention of some 100 people, including Oleg Orlov," who last year won the assembly's Sakharov human rights prize, parliament president Jerzy Buzek said in a statement.
"I call on the Russian authorities to cease this heavy-handed treatment of peaceful demonstrators," he added.
Activists have been holding regular protests in the Russian capital, which are routinely denied authorisation and dispersed by riot police, in defence of the constitutional right to public gathering.
Orlov, head of the Memorial human rights center, was among around 100 people arrested at a demonstration on Sunday, along with Kremlin critic Boris Nemtsov and Lev Ponomarev, leader of the Movement for Human Rights.
All the detainees were later released, according to a spokesman for the opposition Solidarnost movement.
"It is the second time since the award of the 2009 Sakharov Prize in Strasbourg in December that one of our laureates has been arrested," said former Polish PM Buzek.
On New Year's Eve, 82-year-old veteran dissident Lyudmila Alexeyeva -- also a Sakharov laureate -- was briefly detained by Russian police at a similar rally in Moscow.
The EU parliament prize, named after late Soviet dissident Andrei Sakharov, is awarded annually.
Previous winners include Nelson Mandela, Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi and former United Nations chief Kofi Annan.
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