Authorities and truckers report provocations around protests in Dagestan

In Dagestan, there are people who, at the background of truckers’ protests, are engaged in staging professional provocations, Ramazan Jafarov, the Deputy Prime Minister, said on April 9 claims.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on March 27, Russian truck drivers resumed mass protests. They demand to abolish the transport tax, reduce fuel excises and cancel the "Platon" system introduced to collect tolls from drivers of heavy trucks on federal roads.

According to Jafarov's story, "since Friday, April 7, 2017, the second batch of fake video clips has been spread in the Dagestani segment of social networks and Instant Messengers showing an alleged dispersal of truckers protest and aimed at destabilizing the situation in the republic." The videos show many women, although there are no women at all at the truckers’ protest action.

"Supposedly, the video clips were filmed several years ago at the offence venues, when people blocked the federal highway. We ask you not to succumb to provocations," said Ramazan Jafarov, as quoted today by the RIA “Dagestan”.

In their turn, the truckers, who are in the protest venue, complain about provocations of some strangers, acting in the interests of the authorities.

"There are quite a lot of provocateurs," Abdurashid Samadov, one of the protesters, told in his interview to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent on April 5, adding that on the same day, an unidentified man came out to the centre of the road and began shooting up into the air from a traumatic pistol.

"It was clearly their (meaning the authorities’, – note of the "Caucasian Knot") provocateur," said the trucker, adding that the protesters have no need of such provocations and suggesting that they are staged with the aim to subsequently justify the use of force against the protesters.

Full text of the article is available on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’.