In 1917, after the February Revolution in Petrograd, "Moldavian Revolutionary Committees of Soldiers" were organized in the major Russian cities where recruits from Bessarabia were concentrated: Odessa, Kiev, Sevastopol, Kherson, Novogeorgievsk, Moroski (Minsk gubernia) in Russia, as well as in Iași, Roman, and Bârlad on the Romanian Front, plus smaller ones. Among the main calls on their banners were "Land and liberty", "Down with the war", and "Peoples's right to self-determination". April 1917 was the month with most such gatherings in the Russian Empire. On , a huge meeting was held in Odessa, where more than 10,000 Bessarabian soldiers participated. The resolution adopted by the meeting demanded (a) political autonomy for Bessarabia, (b) organization in Bessarabia of Moldavian military units ("cohorts") in order to stop the violence to the population produced by the deserting irregulars of the partially disintegrating Russian Army, news of which had reached the soldiers, making them feel very worried for the fate of their families. This "congress" was also attended by a number of Bessarabian students, who obtained from the Russian authorities the permission to hold for those interested Romanian history and literature courses at the University of Odessa, as well as a number of Bessarabian intellectuals, such as Emanoil Catelli, Baluță, and others, who were most probably the authors of the resolution passed.