Protest unfolded before “Putin will teach you to love fatherland” banner
Kurt Nimmo
Infowars.com
February 19, 2014
Demonstrating their contempt for dissent and the media, Cossacks whipped, beat and pepper sprayed members of Pussy Riot as they attempted to perform in Sochi.
“Near the Sochi 2014 banner singing ‘Putin will teach you to love fatherland’ Pussy Riot were attacked by Cossacks, whipped and thoroughly sprayed by pepper gas,” wrote Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, a band member released from a Russian gulag in December.
Cossacks are Slavs primarily from Ukraine and Southern Russia. Formerly allied with the Tsardom of Russia, they are known for their military culture and association with anti-Bolshevik forces following the Russian Revolution.
Members of Pussy Riot were arrested for hooliganism, prosecuted and imprisoned following a performance staged in Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Savior. The performance was subsequently released as a video, “Punk Prayer – Mother of God, Chase Putin Away!” Pussy Riot said their protest was aimed at the Orthodox Church and its support for Putin during his election campaign.
Nadezhda Tolokonnikova claims the group is feminist and “part of the global anti-capitalist movement, which consists of anarchists, Trotskyists, feminists and autonomists,” she told Der Spiegel in September, 2012.
“We see ourselves as part of the West, and we’re a product of European culture. The shortcomings of consumer society do disturb us, but we’re not looking to destroy consumer society. Freedom is at the core of our ideology, and our concept of freedom is a Western one. This is a fight for the right definition of freedom,” Tolokonnikova told the German website.
У одного из членов #pussyriot рассечена бровь после нападения казаков. Газовые балоны, хлысты. Полиция не реагировала pic.twitter.com/EGkXY7N8II
— Мария Алехина (@MashaAlekhina) February 19, 2014
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