Dennis the 'Bloody Peasant'
2nd October 2012, 09:49
Shots were fired and several people injured after pro-Communist demonstrators fought running battles with security forces loyal to President Boris Yeltsin in Moscow.
Riot squads were moved in to clear the streets after protesters erected barriers and set car tyres ablaze across the Garden Ring Road, Moscow's main thoroughfare.
Riot police drafted in reinforcements and water cannon to disperse the crowds but were driven back with a hail of home-made missiles.
The protesters supported rebel ministers occupying the White House (Russia's parliament building). President Yeltsin set himself on a collision course with MPs by dissolving parliament and called for fresh elections on 21 September.
The rebels demanded Yeltsin reverse his earlier decision to dissolve the conservative parliament.
Vice President Alexander Rutskoi, a key player among the hard-line communists and nationalist parliament rebels, is claiming the presidency. He called on people to take to the streets again and urged police officers to switch their allegiance.
In Context
Yeltsin's "shock therapy", post-communist, free market reforms were increasingly unpopular in the run-up to the 1993 crisis.
Coupled with poor living standards and widespread corruption the reforms fuelled an ongoing power struggle between the president and parliament which peaked with parliament's dissolution on 21 September.
The protests of 2 October escalated into a complete storming the following day by parliament supporters of the White House and Moscow's Mayoral offices, and a partial take-over of the national television centre. But on 4 October, troops and tanks loyal to President Yeltsin opened fire on the White House and by the next morning the rebellion had been crushed. President Yeltsin pardoned the ringleaders. An estimated 146 people died in the struggle.
(More at http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/october/2/newsid_2486000/2486383.stm (http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/october/2/newsid_2486000/2486383.stm))
Riot squads were moved in to clear the streets after protesters erected barriers and set car tyres ablaze across the Garden Ring Road, Moscow's main thoroughfare.
Riot police drafted in reinforcements and water cannon to disperse the crowds but were driven back with a hail of home-made missiles.
The protesters supported rebel ministers occupying the White House (Russia's parliament building). President Yeltsin set himself on a collision course with MPs by dissolving parliament and called for fresh elections on 21 September.
The rebels demanded Yeltsin reverse his earlier decision to dissolve the conservative parliament.
Vice President Alexander Rutskoi, a key player among the hard-line communists and nationalist parliament rebels, is claiming the presidency. He called on people to take to the streets again and urged police officers to switch their allegiance.
In Context
Yeltsin's "shock therapy", post-communist, free market reforms were increasingly unpopular in the run-up to the 1993 crisis.
Coupled with poor living standards and widespread corruption the reforms fuelled an ongoing power struggle between the president and parliament which peaked with parliament's dissolution on 21 September.
The protests of 2 October escalated into a complete storming the following day by parliament supporters of the White House and Moscow's Mayoral offices, and a partial take-over of the national television centre. But on 4 October, troops and tanks loyal to President Yeltsin opened fire on the White House and by the next morning the rebellion had been crushed. President Yeltsin pardoned the ringleaders. An estimated 146 people died in the struggle.
(More at http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/october/2/newsid_2486000/2486383.stm (http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/october/2/newsid_2486000/2486383.stm))