2024 Bashkortostan protests

You can help expand this article with text translated from the corresponding article in Russian. (February 2024) Click [show] for important translation instructions. Machine translation, like DeepL or Google Translate, is a useful starting point for translations, but translators must revise errors as necessary and confirm that the translation is accurate, rather than simply copy-pasting machine-translated text into the English Wikipedia. Do not translate text that appears unreliable or low-quality. If possible, verify the text with references provided in the foreign-language article. You must provide copyright attribution in the edit summary accompanying your translation by providing an interlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary is Content in this edit is translated from the existing Russian Wikipedia article at [[:ru:Январские протесты в Башкортостане (2024)]]; see its history for attribution. You may also add the template {{Translated|ru|Январские протесты в Башкортостане (2024)}} to the talk page. For more guidance, see Wikipedia:Translation.

This article needs to be updated. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information. (February 2024)

The 2024 Bashkortostan protests (Bashkir: Башҡортостанда протесттар, romanized: Bashqortostanda protesttar) are a series of protests started on 15 January 2024 beginning in the Republic of Bashkortostan, Russia, sparked by the authorities initiating a criminal case against the Bashkir environmental activist Fail Alsynov, who was subsequently sentenced to four years in prison. This led to demonstrations in the town of Baymak, where at least 1,000 Bashkir protesters assembled. The protests resulted in clashes with the riot police, who in response deployed tear gas and batons against the protesters.^[8][9] The protests spread into the regional capital of Ufa on 19 January, where 10 people were arrested in response.^[10]

Due to the growing protests in Bashkortostan, messaging services WhatsApp and Telegram were allegedly blocked across the region, as messages sent by users from major cities such as Moscow, Kazan, Nizhny Novgorod, and Saint Petersburg failed to deliver. Most of the failed messages were from the city of Ufa, which is estimated to comprise 22% of all messages in the country, according to the data provided by the Downdetector service.^[11][12]