The Russian authorities have been instructed to banish the poor - and the rain - from St Petersburg ahead of this weekend's G8 summit.

Should the horizon darken, the Russian air force will be on stand by to "seed the clouds", pumping ions into the air that supposedly will ensure the rain falls anywhere but on the Konstantinovsky Palace, where leaders of the Group of Eight industrialised nations will stay.

Security forces in President Vladimir Putin's home city have resorted to the type of repression that has given fuel to critics who argue that Russia does not deserve to belong to a club that supposedly espouses democratic values.

Terrified that opposition activists could use the summit to air grievances, police and the Federal Security Service, the spy agency that replaced the KGB, have allegedly resorted to heavy-handed tactics to persuade potential demonstrators to leave the city.

Last week, they came for Andrei Dmitryev, the local leader of the radical National Bolshevik Party, with instructions to leave the city and a demand that he sign a form promising that his followers would not protest in public.

When he refused to sign, he said, the officers threatened him with rape. "Two big men entered the room and when I again refused to sign the paper they forced me onto the table and started to take down my trousers," he said. "I signed the paper." He was put on a train to Moscow but has since sneaked back to St Petersburg.

Others also speak of intimidation, sudden visits from army officers carrying military call-up papers. Some say they have been beaten up by club-wielding gangs dressed in balaclavas. Over the weekend, two female activists with a Left-wing organisation were jailed for 10 days after they were caught handing out anti-government leaflets.

Even if the leaders will not visit the city themselves, thousands of lower level delegates and journalists will and a clean-up has been ordered.

The sale of vodka has been banned on the streets after 11pm to counter drunkenness and unsightly kiosks that proliferated around the city have been torn down. There are even rumours that knife-wielding officers have been dispatching St Petersburg's considerable population of stray dogs. A security clampdown means that many residents will not be able to leave their homes.

Tourism companies are complaining that closing the airport and waterways will deprive them of much-needed income at the peak of the high season. Charities say some of the homeless are being evicted, although not on the same scale as when thousands were imprisoned in three camps during the 300th anniversary celebrations.

Mr Putin wants to ensure that the world's most powerful politicians never come face to face with the aspects of St Petersburg that most discomfit him. Tony Blair and other leaders will leave the Konstantinovsky Palace only on Saturday, to dine at Peterhoff, one of Peter the Great's residences. The Prime Minister will stay in a 20-room "cottage" with a swimming pool and traditional bathhouse, where he can flog himself with birch twigs, as is the custom.

Telegraph UK