The Kobozev Bread Riots (1989)

The Kobozev Bread Riots were protests over bread and flour shortages in Kobozev (now Nurzhan) in 1989, during perestroika. Queues outside bakeries turned into street marches, and for the first time protesters openly demanded freedom for the Syro-Iradi Catholic Church, the return of the Latin alphabet and elected government.^[1]

The authorities dispersed the marches and arrested several organizers, and First Secretary Vasily Chernov, in office since November 1986, resisted most of the demands.^[2] Iradi historians regard the riots as the starting point of the national movement that grew into the Winter Uprising of 1992.

References

1. ^ Talas State University Press (2011). Iradistan: A History of the Iradi SSR, 1925–1991. Talas, pp. 23–311.
2. ^ Chernov, Vasily (2001). The Broken Union: Memories of the Final First Secretary. Moscow.