A Russian court on Thursday jailed a radical opposition leader Sergei Udaltsov to four and a half years for organising "mass riots" ahead of Vladimir Putin's inauguration as president in 2012. Judge Alexander Zamashnyuk sentenced both Udaltsov and his political ally Leonid Razvozzhayev to four and a half years in a corrective labour camp for organising a rally against Putin and plotting further unrest. The judge said the men had organised "mass riots accompanied by violence against the authorities and damage to property." Udaltsov, the shaven leader of a banned radical leftist group, rose to prominence as part of the protest movement against Putin's return to the Kremlin for a third term. He responded to the verdict by declaring a hunger strike, his lawyer said after the verdict.