Report: Russian Police Compel Young Demonstrators To Complete Questionnaire

Russian police have created a special questionnaire for youths who participated in anticorruption rallies organized by opposition politician Aleksei Navalny in March, according to a report by the RBK information agency.

The agency interviewed several Moscow teenagers who said they and their parents were ordered to fill out a questionnaire consisting of 60 questions regarding the children's upbringing, members of their families, their political views, their background, the families' financial situation, how they learned about the Navalny's rallies, and other personal questions.

The RBK posted images of the list of questions on its website.

It is unclear if young people in other cities were also given the questionnaire.

The large presence of teenagers and young people at the anticorruption protests in nearly 100 cities and towns across Russia attracted the Kremlin's attention.

Russian President Vladimir Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, claimed a day after the protests that children had been promised "rewards" for taking part and suggested that the government will investigate whether minors were paid.

Peskov pointed out that the authorities in Moscow declined to give opposition leader Navalny permission to hold a march and rally at a central location and proposed alternate sites on the outskirts of the city.

Tens of thousands of people took part in the demonstrations on March 26, and the OVD-Info monitoring group said more than 1,000 were detained in Moscow alone.

Based in reporting by RBK