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TRUCKERS BLOCKADE * Russia: Against government new tolls and taxes
* Moscow - Russian truckers, irate over new tolls, block roads
(Video: "Truckers on the approaches to Moscow", by Radio Liberty, streamed live on Dec 4, 2015 - Live from Khimki, which brought together participants of the protest action against the system of toll payments "Plato")
-- Hundreds of long-distance truckers blocked a lengthy section of the ring road circling the capital on Friday to protest a new national toll. The direct object of their ire was Igor Rotenberg, the scion of a billionaire oligarch clan close to Mr. Putin, who owns half of a new, GPS-based system that, when fully operational, will charge truckers fees on all federal highways. The truckers are widely dispersed and hence difficult to control, and their sentiments reflect those of the entire middle class... Under the new system, drivers must buy a tracking device and pay according to their mileage. An 800-mile round trip between Moscow and St. Petersburg costs an extra $33 at current exchange rates and will rise to $66 next March. Truckers said that the new toll amounted to about 10 percent of their revenue for each trip, and that it came on top of other hefty transportation taxes, sharply reducing their monthly wages of around $500 to $600. Truckers mocked the idea that the toll money would end up being invested in Russia’s notoriously poor roads... The new toll system is operational only in the Moscow region for now, but since that is such a national hub it has already elicited protests across the country, including in the Dagestan republic, in the cities of Vologda, Nizhny Novgorod, Bryansk, in Smolensk in eastern Russia, in Yekaterinburg in the central Urals, and in St. Petersburg... The Putin administration itself repeatedly offered dialogue and compromise in the form of graduated tariffs, but the truckers are demanding the tolls be scrapped entirely. Mr. Putin himself has not commented publicly on the protests... All across Moscow, the movement of the trucks circling the city was being monitored on various social media, inspiring a lively stream of criticism and support...
Moscow, Russia - The NYT (USA), by NEIL MacFARQUHARDEC. 4, 2015
* Moscow - In move to placate truckers, Russian parliament proposes lower fine for violating trucking law
(Photo: Trucks waiting, the drivers say they intend to drive on Moscow to press their opposition) -- Moscow, Russia - AP/NewSer - Dec 4, 2015
Labels: drivers' blockade
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