I took part in the protests against the war on Ukraine in Saint Petersburg on Thursday — the first day of the declaration of war — and on Sunday. On the first day, friends and comrades of mine published posts on Facebook with the intention of rallying in the streets, so we gathered with fellow activists in the Russian Socialist Movement near the Gostiny Dvor Metro station, where the protest was spontaneous and disorganized. From the very beginning, police detachments and police vans were ready waiting for us. The authorities likely monitor all social networks, allowing them to take such preemptive measures.

In front of the Metro station, the confused people were already surrounded by police and riot units. People did not understand what to do or how to express their position against the war in Ukraine. Among the participants in the action, there were people of all ages, but practically no posters and symbols; the composition of the participants of the action seemed to me similar to the rallies against the imprisonment of Alexei Navalny.

After twenty minutes of being there — and after the police broadcast to disperse the crowd — the timid cries of “No war” and “Putin is a killer” finally began. They began to arrest people almost immediately; right in front of me they detained an elderly woman with a “No war” poster. Gradually, there were more and more people, and the demands to stop the war became more confident and loud, then the OMON (Otryad Mobil’nyy Osobogo Naznacheniya, Special Purpose Mobile Unit; the Russian equivalent of SWAT) and police units actively began an operation to detain people and clear the area. During this time, I managed to give two interviews to journalists; after the second interview, they began arresting me. I did not resist, so the detention went quite calmly; I was pushed into an already full police van.