(MOSCOW) – Russians across the country are tearing down election posters belonging to the ruling United Russia party and posting videos of the acts on social media, in a spontaneous wave of protest ahead of upcoming elections.
The videos show citizens removing campaign materials from bulletin boards, throwing them in bins and attaching ironic slogans about disposing of yet another political figure. Other clips juxtapose glossy campaign promises with dilapidated apartment blocks, litter strewn courtyards, mould covered walls and broken staircases, highlighting the gap between official messaging and daily reality.
Anti war activists have joined the campaign, systematically destroying election paraphernalia and banners urging enlistment as contract soldiers. Moscow authorities have responded by detaining young people for 15 days on charges of petty hooliganism for removing pieces of paper from bulletin boards.
Meanwhile, regional officials continue to offer increasingly strained explanations for the fuel crisis spreading across the country. The governor of the Kuzbass region, when asked about kilometre long queues at filling stations, insisted there is no petrol shortage in the region. The problem, he said, is simply that there are not enough petrol stations.
The remarks ignore the reality that Ukrainian drone strikes on Russian oil refineries and paralysed rail logistics have disrupted supply chains. Officials have avoided mentioning these causes, instead urging drivers to wait patiently for an exciting future with more filling stations where they will still find no petrol.
Separately, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has claimed Ukraine is deliberately targeting Russian kindergartens, schools, hospitals and children’s facilities. No journalists, international observers or local residents have reported such destruction.
The claims come against a backdrop of documented Russian crimes, including the bombing of the drama theatre in Mariupol where the word “children” was written in large letters outside. According to confirmed data from international organisations and the United Nations, Russian forces have killed more than 700 Ukrainian children and maimed nearly 3,000 others. Russia has also illegally deported and abducted more than 20,000 Ukrainian children for forced russification, a crime for which the International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant for the Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.
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