Topless anti-Russia protesters damage monument outside UN in Geneva

Member from Ukrainian feminist group Femen.
| Photo Credit: REUTERS

Topless members of the Ukrainian feminist protest group Femen took chainsaws to a giant wooden sculpture outside the United Nations in Geneva on Friday, prompting police to intervene, witnesses said.

The two women wearing the Ukrainian flag as garters shouted “Keep Russia out of the UN” and “Fuck Russia” as they sawed into a monument known as the Broken Chair, leaving over a dozen gashes.

The three-legged structure, a work by Swiss artist Daniel Berset erected on the Place des Nations in 1997, has become a landmark in the city of Geneva. It was designed to raise awareness about the impact of landmines on civilians in conflict zones.

A Geneva police spokesperson confirmed that four people had been brought in for questioning in relation to the incident.

Since it was founded in Kyiv in 2008, the Femen movement has won fame and notoriety in Europe for its protests – usually topless – against sex tourism, homophobia and religious institutions. (Reporting by Cecile Mantovani and Pierre Albouy; Additional reporting and writing by Emma Farge, editing by William Maclean)