Doctors urge Navalny to end prison hunger strike
Staunch Putin critic hails mass protests
MOSCOW — Imprisoned Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny said in an emotional message from behind bars Thursday that he felt “pride and hope” after learning from his lawyer about the mass protests demanding his freedom that swept across Russia the previous night.
Meanwhile, Navalny’s doctors urged him to “immediately” end a prison hunger strike now in its fourth week “to save his life and health.” And a top aide said Wednesday night’s protests seemed to have brought a compromise from Russian authorities on getting Navalny the medical help he had demanded when launching the hunger strike.
In an Instagram post Thursday, Navalny called people who turned
out to protest in his support “the salvation of Russia.”
The 44-year-old who is President Vladimir Putin’s most well-known critic said he hadn’t
known “what was really happening” outside the prison because he only has access to one TV channel, but his lawyer visited him Thursday and brought him up to speed. “And, I will sincerely say, two feelings are raging inside me: pride and hope.”
“People are marching in the street. It means they know and understand everything,” said Navalny. “They won’t give up their future, the future of their children, their country. Yes, it will be difficult and dark for some time. But those pulling Russia back historically are doomed. There are more of us in any case.”
Navalny was arrested in January upon his return from Germany, where he had spent five months recovering from a nerve agent poisoning he blames on the Kremlin — accusations that Russian officials reject.
Soon after, a court found that the politician’s stay in Germany violated the terms of his suspended sentence for a 2014 embezzlement conviction and ordered him to serve 2 1/2 years in prison.
The mass street protests in support of Navalny — which authorities had declared unlawful — swept dozens of cities and smaller towns across Russia. The largest crowds were seen in Moscow, where thousands marched down the city center amid a heavy police presence.
Yet unlike on past occasions, officers in riot gear didn’t interfere with the rally in the Russian capital, allowing crowds to swarm streets and squares for hours. According to OVD-Info, a rights group that monitors political arrests, police detained only 31 people in Moscow, which usually accounts for the vast majority of arrests across the country.
But overall, OVD-Info tallied more than 1,900 arrests Wednesday night, with more than 800 in St. Petersburg. While some violent detentions, with police using stun guns, were reported in St. Petersburg, in many cities the demonstrations went on without clashes with law enforcement.
Leonid Volkov, Navalny’s top strategist noted that the number of arrests was significantly lower.