MOSCOW, May 25 (RIA Novosti) – Six riot police officers who were injured in clashes during an anti-Putin rally in Moscow have received new apartments as a reward, the Interior Ministry’s Moscow city department said on Friday.
The apartments were provided from the ministry’s own special housing stock, not the city’s, which does not violate the rights of people on a waiting list for municipal housing.
Police cracked down hard on an anti-Putin rally in Moscow on May 6, clubbing demonstrators and making scores of arrests after hundreds of people briefly broke through their lines in a bid to take their protest to the Kremlin walls.
The violence came on the eve of Vladimir Putin’s inauguration as president. Putin secured a third term in the Kremlin at disputed elections in March.
Police said four officers were injured by protesters armed with bottles and stones. A number of police helmets floated in the Moskva River after being torn from officers.