Riot police, opposition backers in St. Petersburg clash in demonstrations

ST. PETERSBURG, Russia – Club-swinging riot police clashed Sunday with opposition supporters as an anti-Kremlin protest dispersed in Russia’s second-largest city, chasing small groups of demonstrators, beating some on the ground and hauling them into police buses.\nIt was not immediately clear what sparked the violence after the rally, which city authorities had authorized and took place under a heavy police presence with at least one helicopter hovering above.\nAlthough city authorities gave permission for the rally in a square on the edge of central St. Petersburg, they had banned plans for the demonstrators to march afterwards to the city government headquarters.\nPolice trucks and helmeted officers blocked the planned march route. At the end of the 90-minute-long rally, organizers did not exhort them to conduct the banned march but suggested they go on their own to the city government building over the next few days. When the rally dispersed, most participants went to a nearby subway station, where clashes broke out.\nIn one, police chased a group that included Sergei Gulyayev, a member of the city legislature who had been arrested at a protest in March. Police grabbed some members of the group and pounded them in the head with nightsticks before putting them on buses; it was not immediately known if Gulyayev was among those taken away.\nIn another clash, police charged a group holding a banner professing love for the city.\nThe violence came a day after clashes at a similar opposition protest in Moscow, where police detained at least 170 people, sometimes with harsh force.