Protests as Navalny imprisoned
MOSCOW: A Russian court jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny on Tuesday, ignoring the West in a ruling the opposition politician blamed on President Vladimir Putin’s personal hatred and fear of him.
The Moscow court handed Navalny (44) a threeandahalfyear sentence, but his lawyer said the anticorruption blogger would actually serve two years and eight months in jail because of time already spent under house arrest.
His lawyers said they would appeal.
The decision, which followed nationwide protests calling for Navalny’s release, will further strain relations with the West, which is considering imposing sanctions on Russia over its handling of the case.
The United States, Britain, Germany and the EU urged Moscow to immediately free Navalny, with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken saying Washington would coordinate closely with allies to hold Russia accountable.
Russia is already under numerous Western sanctions and analysts say the West’s options for more pressure are limited.
Russia has suggested Navalny is a CIA asset, a charge he rejects, and has told the West to stay out of its domestic affairs.
Navalny, one of Putin’s most prominent critics, was arrested on January 17 for alleged parole violations after returning from Germany where he had been recovering from being poisoned with a militarygrade nerve agent.
Navalny said Russian state security agents had put the poison in his underpants, something the Kremlin denied. He used Tuesday’s hearing to try to frame Putin’s place in history.
‘‘[Putin’s] only method is killing people. However much he pretends to be a great geopolitician, he’ll go down in history as a poisoner. There was Alexander the Liberator, Yaroslav the Wise, and Putin the Underwear Poisoner,’’ Navalny said.
His supporters, on hearing the ruling, encouraged people to gather in central Moscow although riot police had already taken up position. The Moscow metro shut down three central stations.
Reuters reporters saw hundreds of protesters and the police detaining some of them violently. Some of them chanted, ‘‘Putin is a thief!’’ and ‘‘Putin is a poisoner!‘‘
The OVDInfo monitoring group later reported 1408 arrests nationwide, more than 1000 of those in Moscow.
After his arrest, Navalny released a YouTube video making allegations about Putin’s wealth that was viewed over 100 million times. The Kremlin said it was false.
Navalny, in a fiery speech to the court, alleged he was going to be jailed because of Putin’s concerns about him as a political rival, a suggestion the Kremlin has laughed off, referring to Navalny as a marginal figure without wide popular support.
Putin (68) has dominated Russian politics since 2000 and could rule until 2036 under constitutional changes approved in a referendum last year. — Reuters