Followers of a Russian opposition leader scored Facebook after it apparently blocked a page which supported an outspoken critic of President Vladimir Putin.

About 13,000 people followed a Facebook event page which called for a protest in central Moscow, where Putin critic Alexei Navalny could be sentenced up to ten years in prison over fraud charges. The state-run RIA-Novosti news agency reported that the Internet regulator Roskomnadzor asked Facebook to take down the page, which can no longer be viewed within Russia.

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The watchdog agency spokesman Vadim Ampelonsky said prosecutors made a demand to limit access to several pages calling for an unauthorized mass event, including groups in the social media website. Facebook neither confirmed nor denied it blocked the page.

The decision angered Navalny, the head of Russia's opposition Progress Party and former U.S. ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul. Navalny said blocking the page was a rather unpleasant and surprising behavior by Russian Facebook and he thought the website would at least ask for a court order rather than quickly block pages as soon as the state Internet watchdog asked.

McFaul added that taking down Navalny's page set a bad precedent and that the website should fix its 'mistake' immediately.

Protest supporters lost no time signing up onto similar event pages and they put up new ones criticizing Facebook's "censorship." They are now calling for a protest in Moscow's Manezhnaya Square on January 15, the day Navalny will be handed down a verdict in a one of his biggest fraud cases.

Navalny, 38, along with his brother Oleg have been accused of embezzling almost 27 million rubles when the Russian subsidiary of cosmetics maker Yves Rocher booked their delivery company.

The opposition activist was sentenced to five years in another case for embezzling from a state timber company. The sentence was suspended later.

Navalny claimed the cases against him are based on lies. He has spent almost a year under house arrest.

TagsRussia, netizens, censorship, Alexei Navalny