Anti-Putin protests continue
Published:Tuesday | January 10, 2012 | 12:00 AM
MOSCOW (AP):
The head of the Russian Orthodox Church has urged the government to listen to protesters demanding free elections.
Patriarch Kirill on Saturday warned both sides that Russia cannot afford another revolution.
"The government should, through dialogue and by listening to society, correct the course and then everything will be fine," he said in an interview broadcast last Saturday, the day on which Russians and other Orthodox Christians celebrate Christmas.
Tens of thousands of people turned out for two demonstrations in Moscow to protest vote fraud in last month's parliamentary election and call for an end to Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's 12-year rule.
A third demonstration is planned for February 4, a month ahead of a presidential election that Putin hopes will extend his power for at least six more years. He first served as president from 2000 to 2008.
The patriarch, whose church has close ties to the Kremlin, spoke of the need to preserve a strong state.
He warned the protesters against being used by those fighting for poli-tical power, comparing the opposition leaders to the Bolsheviks whose 1917 revolution brought down czarist Russia.