A 12-year-old boy was reportedly among those detained on Saturday when thousands of Russians took to the streets in anti-government protests, local media report.



Riot police detained more than 1,000 people who joined opposition activist Alexei Navalny’s call to protest the rule of President Vladimir Putin ahead of his inauguration on Monday.

The boy was detained after joining protesters in the city of Saratov. After approaching him, police drove off with him in their car, the local news outlet FreeNews-Volga reports. Footage of the boy's alleged detention quickly did the rounds on social media.

The OVD-Info police monitoring site later wrote that the boy’s father has been charged with neglecting his parental duties.

