TODAY: Adoption march draws thousands, Peskov defends Kremlin’s adoption ban; Serdyukov may face questioning as a suspect; Lavrov says Assad’s exit cannot be precondition for a crisis deal; Depardieu weighs in on Russia’s opposition; Polonsky to be released after paying victims; Putin marks press holiday; Yuri Schmidt to be buried in St. Petersburg.

Yesterday’s ‘March Against Scum’, held in Moscow to protest the ban on U.S. adoptions of Russian orphans, drew thousands of supporters in ‘the most prominent expression of public anger [against the measure] thus far’. Police estimate that 9,000 people marched; opposition leader Sergei Udaltsov put the number at over 50,000.  ‘[T]his law is a worse thing to do to those children than the treatment animals get in other countries,’ said one of the organisers.  RFE/RL has video from the march, at which nine people were detained.  In response, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that protesters were ‘absolutely right’ to express their concerns about the fate of orphans, and said that the ban constituted ‘an intention to create necessary conditions [for ease of adoption] in this country’.  A U.S. political science professor suggested that the ban could be part of a strategy to boost Russia’s diminishing demographic.  Originally questioned as a witness, Former Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov faces being considered a suspect in the Investigative Committee’s fraud investigation of the sale of Defense Ministry real estate.