St. Petersburg’s Art Protest Against West-2017 Exercises

Dressed in clowns, Petersburgers occupied the Aurora and parodied Putin's "war games".

The event was held in St. Petersburg on Sunday afternoon. Anti-war activists dressed in clown suits lined up on the deck of the cruiser Aurora. They demanded the growth of the military budget: "It is unfair that schools, hospitals and pensioners have some kind of assistance, at a time when we could arrange military exercises with this money, and then – kill!"

The activists were holding placards in their hands: "It Is Carrying On A War", "We Need Enemies" and "Did Not Serve – Not A Clown" and the flag "Clown State".

RTVi reports that the group included civil activists, feminists and artists from the Rodina group.

Demonstrators claim that they parodied the West-2017 military exercises and the military propaganda in general. According to them, the aim of such propaganda is to distract the population from real problems.

After a while the guard of the cruiser drove the activists out from the ship. No one was detained, although the guard demanded to delete photographs.