PUTIN... YOUR DAY WILL COME
Wife of ‘murdered’ campaigner Navalny blasts Russian regime
ALEXEI Navalny, one of Vladimir Putin’s most outspoken critics, has died in prison on trumped-up charges, prompting accusations of “political murder”.
The devastated wife of Russia’s fiercest opposition politician yesterday called for Putin and his “horrible regime” to face punishment.
Shaking with rage and sorrow Yulia Navalnaya, 47, told a security conference in Germany: “We cannot trust Putin and the Putin government. They always lie.
“If this is true, I want Putin, his entire entourage, Putin’s friends, his government to know they will bear responsibility for what they did to our country, to my family, to my husband.”
The economist stormed: “This day will come very soon. Both this regime and Putin must bear responsibility for all the terrible things they have been doing to our country.”
Officials said Navalny, who was serving a 19-year sentence on bogus extremism charges, collapsed while walking in a penal colony.
The lawyer, who spent his life fighting Kremlin corruption and survived a bungled poison plot in
2020, had been moved to the “special regime” colony 1,200 miles from Moscow just a few weeks ago.
US President Joe Biden said: “There is no doubt that the death of Navalny was a consequence of something Putin and his thugs did.”
Ukraine leader Volodymyr Zelensky added: “It’s obvious he was murdered, like the thousands of others tortured to death. Putin does not care as long as he maintains his position.”
Last night President Michael D Higgins said: “The freedom to express dissenting views is a fundamental tenet of a democracy and any accountable system. The incarceration of Alexei Navalny contradicted this.
“It is important that all of those who believe in these principles support the making available of all of the facts surrounding Alexei
Navalny’s death.”
British Foreign
Secretary David
Cameron added:
“Putin’s Russia fabricated charges against Navalny, poisoned him, sent him to an arctic penal colony and now he has tragically died.
“Putin should be accountable for what has happened. No one should doubt the dreadful nature of his regime.”
Navalny, who came second in a bid to become mayor of Moscow in 2013, had previously criticised Putin for the war in Ukraine. He told him: “You won’t shut me up.”
The legal expert had been in jail since January 2021 when he returned to Moscow from Germany after the Kremlin tried to poison him.
He went on to receive three prison sentences, all of which he called politically motivated.
Last night, protesters gathered outside the Russian Embassy in London and called for Putin – who only ever referred to Navalny as “that person” – to be held accountable for the lawyer’s death.
Many of the campaigners chanted “Putin is a killer”, and held up signs with slogans such as “Putin will never stop killing”, “Never give up” and “We are Navalny”.