About 200 Kasparov supporters later gathered outside the police station where he was being held, shouting “freedom for political prisoners.” Police waded into the crowd after about an hour, beating some demonstrators with truncheons and kicking them, forcing the crowd to disperse.

“All the best,” one riot police officer said ironically as the crowd was pushed away.

Kasparov later was taken to a Moscow court. During a break from hearings, he told reporters he faces charges of shouting anti-government slogans.

“This regime has shown its true colors and its true face,” Kasparov said. “Today is an important demonstration of the degeneration of Putin’s regime.”

The protest rally, one in a series of so called Dissenters’ Marches, increased tension between opposition supporters who complain the Kremlin is cracking down on political dissent and authorities who vow to block any unauthorized demonstrations. A similar march planned for St. Petersburg on Sunday also has been banned.

Since the first such march in Moscow in December, Kasparov has emerged as one of President Vladimir Putin’s most prominent critics.

He has vowed to accelerate his protests as Russia draws nearer to presidential and parliamentary elections. Kasparov’s United Civil Front organization works with other opposition groups in a loose alliance called Other Russia, which organized the marches.

Police department spokesman Yevgeny Gildeyev said Kasparov was detained on suspicion of calling for provocations. Gildeyev said about 170 people in total were detained.

City authorities gave permission to Other Russia to hold a rally at Turgenev Square, but denied their request to gather at the more central and prominent Pushkin Square, one of Moscow’s most well-known public spaces. Other Russia defied the ban and declared they would march the two kilometers (1.2 miles) from Pushkin Square to the other site.

Police detained scores of activists at Pushkin Square, but thousands of others began marching. More than 1,000 others gathered at the authorized rally site.

Among them was Mikhail Kasyanov, who was Putin’s first prime minister but now has gone into opposition.

“Everyone should ask the question: what is happening with our authorities — are they still sane, or have they gone mad?” Kasyanov said as the crowd chanted “shame on the government.”

Former Kremlin economic adviser Andrei Illarionov, who came to support the demonstrators, told journalists that the heavy police presence showed “paranoia — there is no rational explanation for this behavior.”

The crowd began dispersing by mid-afternoon.

Opposition forces make a wide array of complaints against the Kremlin on political and economic issues, with particular emphasis on allegations that authorities are suppressing democracy.

Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov, who was observing the march, denied there were political motivations behind the ban, saying authorities were concerned with public order.

“We have sanctioned a large number of events, both pro-government an pro-presidential, and also anti government ones,” the mayor said, according to the news agency Interfax. “Processions are a problem for us. We have not allowed pro presidential organizations to hold them as well.”

In recent months, three demonstrations — all called Dissenters’ Marches — were either broken up harshly or smothered under a massive police presence in Moscow, St. Petersburg and Nizhny Novgorod.

This weekend’s marches could be a key test of the Russian opposition’s determination before parliamentary and presidential elections — and a test of how harshly police may move to block their actions.

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