Banners flew high in Moscow, as an attempt to put a Ukrainian flag on a landmark skyscraper and paint its spire in yellow-blue colors, faced a counter move by a group of daredevils, who decorated another high-rise building with a Russian flag.
A Ukrainian flag appeared on the 176-meter-tall building on
Kotelnicheskaya Embankment in the heart of the capital early on
Wednesday morning.
The perpetrators also managed to paint the upper part of the
massive golden-colored star on top of the spire blue, so that it
would also resemble the yellow-blue Ukrainian national flag.
After several hours, a maintenance crew removed the flag from the
skyscraper and restored the initial golden color to the star.
Селфи дня pic.twitter.com/csfZ8oA4DV
— Ilya Varlamov (@varlamov) August 20, 2014
In connection with the incident, Moscow police have detained four people carrying mountaineering gear.
The police maintain that the two men and two women, (Russian citizens between 25 and 33 years), had been arrested before for similar offenses.
A criminal investigation into vandalism has been launched against
the perpetrators, who are accused of “desecration of a skyscraper
at Kotelnicheskaya Embankment - namely the application of paint
on the spire of the building,” they added.
If found guilty, the four may face a fine of 40,000 rubles around
$1,100), correctional labor of up to a year or up to 3 months’
detention, lawyer Sergey Semeshkin told Rusnovosti.ru.
The daredevils deny their guilt, saying “they only jumped
from the high-rise building with parachutes,” a police
source told the Itar-Tass news agency.
“They claim that they didn’t attach any flag and didn’t paint
the star,” he added.
The events in Moscow have inspired Ukrainian President Petro
Poroshenko to declare a global action called ‘Our colors,’
devoted to the country’s national flag.
“It’s symbolic that today, perhaps, the tallest skyscraper in
Moscow was painted in our colors,” Poroshenko wrote on his
Facebook page.
“I invite Ukrainians around the world to put out Ukrainian flags
on the eve of our Independence Day as part of Our Colors
Initiative. Glory to Ukraine!” he added.
Relations between Moscow and Kiev have seriously deteriorated
since the military coup led to a power shift in Ukraine this
February.
In March, the Ukrainian republic of Crimea refused to accept the
new authorities and reunited with Russia.
Kiev now accuses Moscow of masterminding the unrest in the
south-east of the country and arming the anti-Kiev rebels in
Donetsk and Lugansk Regions, but Russia denies the claims.
Meanwhile, a group of adrenalin junkies climbed another Moscow
landmark skyscraper on Wednesday and attached a Russian flag to
its spire as a reply to the pro-Ukrainian action earlier in the
day.
The seven high-rise buildings, which represent a combination of
Russian Baroque and Gothic styles, were built in Moscow from 1947
to 1953, under Joseph Stalin’s rule.
Since then, the so-called Stalin Skyscrapers have become an
essential feature of the Russian capital’s landscape and an
important symbol of the city, just like the Kremlin and Saint
Basil's Cathedral.