Nearly 3 years after his arrest, it was announced on Friday that Alexei Navalny, the prominent Russian opposition figure and staunch enemy of Russian President Vladimir Putin, had died at the age of 47.
The Russian Prisons Agency said that Navalny felt unwell after walking on Friday and lost consciousness, adding that an ambulance arrived to try to revive him, but he died.
A Russian committee announced that it had launched a procedural investigation into the circumstances of the death of the opposition politician, who launched a campaign against official corruption and organized massive anti-Kremlin protests.
Russian authorities arrested Navalny in January 2021 after he returned to Russia from a period of recovery in Germany following a poisoning attempt that took place a year earlier, for which he held his country's authorities responsible.
Navalny was serving a 19-year prison sentence for being convicted of "extremism" by the Kremlin. At the beginning of December, the Russian authorities brought new charges against Navalny of “sabotage,” which may mean adding three years in prison to his sentence.
At the end of the same month, Navalny was transferred from his former prison in the Vladimir region of central Russia to a “special regime” penal colony, which is the highest security level of prisons in Russia and is located above the Arctic Circle.
This prison is known as the "Polar Wolf." It is an institution inherited from the Soviet labor camps. Prisoners there work specifically in tanning and sewing reindeer skins used by local indigenous people.
Since his imprisonment three years ago, Navalny has spent his days between a regular cell and solitary confinement. According to his spokeswoman, the oppositionist was placed in isolation 24 times, for a total period of 273 days.
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| Russian authorities arrested Navalny in January 2021 after his return to Russia |
Forced silence
Navalny's allies criticized his transfer to the "Polar Wolf," located in the town of Kharp, in a region about 1,900 kilometers northeast of Moscow, as another attempt to force him to silence nearly three months before the presidential elections.
In Putin's Russia, political opponents often disappeared amid inter-group feuds, were imprisoned or deported into exile after imprisonment, were subjected to suspected poisonings, or were subjected to other forms of severe repression.
But Navalny has steadily grown stronger, rising to the top of the opposition through determination, courage, and a deep understanding of how social media can circumvent the Kremlin’s stranglehold on independent news outlets.
Navalny's last words to his supporters were at the beginning of this month and included a call for demonstrations throughout Russia during the presidential elections that will be held from March 15 to 17, which is expected to allow current President Vladimir Putin to remain in power until at least 2030.
At the time, Navalny said on social media, “I like the idea that all those who will vote against Putin will go to the polls at the same time, at noon. Noon against Putin.”
He added from his prison, "This may be strong evidence of the country's mentality," considering that the authorities will not be able to prevent this "completely legal and safe" demonstration.
Navalny called on all opponents of the Kremlin's policy and the Russian invasion of Ukraine to take action "not only in every city, but also in every neighborhood."
“Millions of people can participate, and tens of millions can attend,” Navalny continued on the “X” platform.
From fighting corruption to confronting Putin
In 2007, Navalny began buying shares in giant state-owned oil companies so that he could read their reports and delve into them in search of evidence of corruption, which he documented in his blog.
In the same year, he was expelled from the opposition liberal Yabloko party for participating in "nationalist activities."
Then, in 2011, Navalny established an anti-corruption foundation that attracted large numbers of supporters while revealing the great wealth of pro-Kremlin elites.
In the winter of 2011–2012, Navalny led major protest movements following parliamentary elections in which the United Russia party, led by Putin, won in a victory marred by accusations of fraud.
Navalny was convicted of defrauding the authorities in 2013 in the Kirov region in a timber deal worth 16 million rubles ($500,000) while he was working as an advisor to the governor. At the time, he denied the validity of these accusations and said that they were an attempt to silence him.
In September 2013, Navalny ran for mayor of Moscow but came in second place behind its outgoing Kremlin-backed mayor, Sergei Sobyanin.
Navalny accused Sobyanin of rigging the elections in a number of polling stations, but his demands for a recount of the votes were rejected.
After that, Navalny's attempts to expose the corruption of the ruling authority in Moscow continued, and in March 2017 he published a video in which he discussed the luxurious life lived by then Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev and his real estate wealth, mentioning a luxurious house he owns that includes a duck farm in the middle of a lake, which led to condemnatory demonstrations.
As a result, he was banned from running in the presidential elections against Putin in December 2018 due to his conviction on charges of embezzlement.
Navalny at the time urged the Russians to boycott the elections, which led, despite the efforts of the opposition, to Putin winning a fourth term.
Poisoning and arrest
In August 2020, Navalny was transferred to a hospital in Siberia after he fell into a coma as a result of losing consciousness during a flight.
He was then transferred to a hospital in Berlin, where he underwent laboratory tests that showed that he had been poisoned with Novichok, a toxic substance that affects the nervous system and was developed during the Soviet era.
The Russian opposition figure at the time accused Putin of orchestrating the poisoning, which the Kremlin denies.
Navalny returned to Moscow in January 2021, where he was arrested shortly after the plane he was traveling on landed.
Demonstrations were organized in Russia in which tens of thousands of people participated to demand his release, but to no avail.
In February of the same year, he was sentenced to two and a half years in prison for violating the conditions of his release in a case in which he had suspended the sentence during his recovery in Germany. He was imprisoned before his sentence was increased a year later to nine years after he was convicted on new charges, in particular embezzlement and contempt of court.
Last August, Navalny, who had become emaciated after losing a lot of weight, was sentenced to 19 years in prison in a facility with a more stringent “special regime” for being convicted of “extremism.”
Corruption documentaries
In 2009, the lawyer and political activist used his blog on the Internet to publish articles exposing corruption in the Russian regime, thus gaining a special base among young people, and his videos received a large following.
He did not hesitate to direct his harsh criticism at the ruling party, and he mocked the United Russia party as “the party of crooks and thieves.”
The film, published by Navalny's Anti-Corruption Fund Foundation in 2017 about Medvedev's corruption, has been viewed more than 35 million times on YouTube.
He was subsequently banned from appearing on state television, but he continued to uncover the wealth of Russian elites, broadcasting the results of his investigations to millions of Russians on social media and YouTube.
By searching land records and offshore company files, Navalny and his team helped uncover the palaces and hidden wealth of top officials.
Among the most eye-catching revelations from Navalny were details of the lavish homes of Putin's allies in Russia and abroad, including a mansion equipped with a spacious air-conditioned storage room for fur coats.
In August 2021, Moscow officially included all of Navalny's organizations, including the Anti-Corruption Fund and its regional offices, on the list of organizations banned in Russia.
About two months earlier, a court in Moscow classified these organizations as “extremist,” considering that they “intentionally published information that incites hatred and hostility toward representatives of authority” and also committed “extremist crimes.”
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