MOSCOW -- Some 20 activists held a picket in the town of Khimki outside of Moscow today to protest the construction of a Moscow-St. Petersburg highway that cuts through a nearby forest, RFE/RL's Russian Service reports.
Yevgeniya Chirikova, the leader of the Khimki Forest Defenders movement, said construction was suspended at the request of the protesters. The demonstrators said they will not leave the site until all the construction equipment has been removed.
The activists say that the local authorities' decision to route the highway through the forest is illegal.