Watchdog

A monument to prominent human rights activist Andrei Sakharov will be placed in the northwestern Russian city of Kirov, RFE/RL's Russian Service reports.

The sculpture will officially be called "The Monument to the Honest Man."

Sakharov's widow, Yelena Bonner, had protested at the idea of a monument bearing her husband's name being erected in Russia under the present circumstances.

Sculptor Grigory Pototsky created the monument, which is a bronze bench with a figure of Sakharov sitting on it.

The work was paid for by former Kirov Oblast Deputy Governor Sergei Karnaukhov. He told RFE/RL the inscription on the sculpture will say: "This monument was inspired by the heroic human deeds of the academic Sakharov."

Karnaukhov said that if Kirov authorities give their approval, the sculpture will be placed symbolically with the figure's back to Kirov's old prison and his face looking toward a church. Passersby would be able sit on the bench next to the Sakharov figure.

Sakharov was a prominent Soviet nuclear physicist, dissident, and human rights activist. He was a chief advocate of civil liberties and reforms in the Soviet Union. Sakharov was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1975, and died in 1989 at the age of 68.

Three activists in Russia's eastern Irkutsk Oblast have begun a hunger strike to protest high utility prices and corruption in the region, RFE/RL's Russian Service reports.

Aleksandr Gorobets, the chairman of the veterans' organization Patriot in the city of Angarsk; Communist Party Committee Secretary in Angarsk Sergei Brenyuk; and doctor Tatyana Denisova announced that they are refusing food but will drink water and take vitamins during the action.

Protests in Angarsk have been going on for months and Irkutsk Governor Dmitry Mezentsev has promised to resolve problems connected with high utility tariffs and corruption. But protesters say he has not kept his promises.

The hunger strikers say that on June 1, which is International Children's Day, two mothers will join their strike. They said the women each have several children and Gorobets and his deputy, Yury Paranichev, visited their small rooms in a local dormitory earlier this year and promised to provide them with social and financial allowances.

But the assistance reportedly has not been received.

The strikers also started a fundraising campaign to cover the travel expenses for a trip by Angarsk residents to Moscow, where they plan to hold protests.

Angarsk, an industrial city founded in 1948, has a population of about 260,000 people.