THE TENS of thousands of young people who marched through Moscow's city centre on April 21st were peaceful and cheerful, even if they were calling their president, Vladimir Putin, a killer. They were smiling as they demanded freedom, perhaps relieved not to be beaten or arrested by the riot police who watched. A timid sense of spring filled the air. They were there in support of Alexei Navalny, Russia's leading opposition politician, who is in prison and on hunger strike. Stanislav, a university student who did not give his last name for fear of being expelled, had been terrified of joining the protest. But the prospect of walking with others like him, of feeling part of a "political nation", brought him to the streets. He, like others, expected the worst.
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