ULYANOVSK, Russia -- Dozens of people gathered in the Russian city of Ulyanovsk on the weekend to protest economic measures recently passed by the government in an effort to ease the financial crisis, RFE/RL's Tatar-Bashkir Service reports.
The rally was organized by the Communist Party and participants said the new laws help the rich by lending them taxpayer money.
Some slogans claimed that Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's government led the country to bankruptcy; others called for him to resign or for the State Duma to be dissolved.
Protesters also demanded the nationalization of major industries and protested privatization that was carried out in the early 1990s.
Ulyanovsk, a Volga city some 900 kilometers east of Moscow, is the hometown of former Soviet leader Vladimir Lenin.