The funerals for the Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in an Arctic prison, could bring together quite a few followers in Moscow tomorrow, given the numerous altars that have been set up in his honor in these two weeks in Russian cities. His widow, Yulia Naválnaya, fears some kind of reaction, because the concentration of opposition supporters will not be to the Kremlin’s liking. Yesterday, from the European Parliament, she warned that she does not know if the police will arrest “those who come to say their last goodbye” to the activist.
To say goodbye to Navalni, who was 47 years old, there will be a public religious service at 2 p.m. (12 p.m. in Barcelona) in the church of the Icon of the Mother of God, in Márino, the neighborhood where he lived, he announced in X (formerly Twitter) its spokesperson, Kira Yármish. He will then be buried in the Borisovo cemetery, also in the southeast of the Russian capital.
Lawyer and opposition activist Alexei Navalny, who was serving prison sentences totaling three decades, died on February 16 in a remote Arctic prison known as Polar Wolf for its harsh living conditions.
The death certificate given to his mother, Ludmila Naválnaya, indicates that he died of natural causes, allies of the anti-corruption activist said. According to prison authorities, the opponent felt ill after taking a walk, lost consciousness and then neither the prison services nor the ambulance that arrived could revive him.
Navalny’s co-religionists reject this version and directly accuse the president of Russia, Vladimir Putin, of ordering what they call “murder.”
Navalni’s widow asked MEPs in Strasbourg for more action against Putin, whom she described as a “bloody monster.” “If you want to defeat Putin, you must innovate. They cannot hurt him with resolutions or sanctions,” she stated.
Many Western leaders also hold the Russian leader responsible. The Kremlin has called these accusations “unacceptable.”
His widow assured that Navalny “was tortured for three years, they made him starve in a tiny cell, isolated from the outside world and without visits, calls or letters, and then they killed him.”
