Kasparov Detained After Anti-Putin Rally in Moscow

Moscow city officials said Kasparov and some of his supporters had attempted to incite police during the march. Kasparov was sentenced to five days in jail.

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"A number of participants in the event provoked disorder, which police curbed," said Mikhail Solomentsev, a spokesman for the city administration. "Responsibility of those participants in the rally who committed unlawful deeds is being established now."

Kasparov ally Eduard Limonov, human rights activist Lev Ponomarev and Union of Right Forces candidate for parliament Mariya Gaidar were also detained after the rally. Gaidar was quickly released.

Many of the rallies planned across Russia were canceled after organizers were arrested, their colleagues said, or they ended quickly when police broke them up violently.

In the southern city of Samara, two activists were detained as they left their apartments Saturday morning and several others vanished and could not be reached on their cellphones, according to Anastasia Kurt-Adzhiyeva, an organizer of the city's protest.

"The reason for not holding the protest are the actions of the security agencies," said Kurt-Adzhiyeva, speaking to journalists in the city. "In these circumstances, we decided not to hold the rally planned for today because we do not see the reason to take to the streets and then spend five hours at a police station."

Police officers wielding batons dispersed an opposition rally in Nazran, the capital of the southern Russian republic of Ingushetia. Echo Moskvy said several protesters were injured.

Earlier Saturday in Nazran, a human rights activist and three journalists in the city to cover the rally were severely beaten and dumped in a field, their station reported. Armed, masked men took the journalists, who had traveled from Moscow for Ren-TV, from their hotel in Nazran about midnight. The station said one of them was in serious condition.

But some officials in the republic said nothing had happened.

"The information spread by some media outlets that REN-TV journalists were abducted and beaten up is not true," the Ingush Interior Ministry said in a statement, describing the reports as "sleazy falsehoods," according to the Russian news agency Interfax.

In Dagestan, the head of the ticket for the opposition Yabloko party died Saturday. Farid Babayev was shot late Wednesday at the entrance to his apartment building. Babayev, a human rights activist, was a vocal critic of the local authorities and United Russia.

He never regained consciousness, health officials said Saturday.

"It's a vivid example of the atmosphere in Dagestan in particular and Russia in general," party leader Grigory Yavlinsky said on Russian television.