Paul
Goble
Staunton, December 16 – Across the
country from Vladivostok to St. Petersburg and from the Caucasus to the Far
North, Russia’s long-haul truckers resumed their strike against the Plato
payment system with even more demands, including not unimportantly a demand
that Vladimir Putin leave office.
They timed the beginning of their
ten-day warning strike to coincide with the birthday of Arkady Rotenberg, the
oligarch to whom their new fees are going. The response of the authorities has
varied from arrests to warnings to simply watching, apparently reflecting a
desire to reduce the number of strikers without provoking violence or more coverage.
The government-controlled media is generally
avoiding coverage of this nationwide event; but opposition outlets and regional
news agencies are starting to report it – and are likely to provide more
coverage tomorrow and in the following days.
For a sample of Russian reporting so
far, see novayagazeta.ru/news/2017/12/15/137936-dalnoboyschiki-ob-yavili-o-nachale-vserossiyskoy-zabastovke,
znak.com/2017-12-15/dalnoboychiki_pozdravili_rotenberga_s_dnem_rozhdeniya_vserossiyskoy_zabastovkoy,
nakanune.ru/news/2017/12/15/22492767/,
newsru.com/russia/15dec2017/stachka.html,
openrussia.org/notes/717329/, kasparov.ru/material.php?id=5A34E710A470C
and newizv.ru/news/politics/15-12-2017/v-peterburge-nachalas-zabastovka-kotoraya-ohvatyvaet-vsyu-rossiyu.
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