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Protests in Russia should continue according to “Navalny team”
© WHAT (dpa)
After mass protests in Russia by jailed Kremlin critic Alexej Navalny on Sunday with thousands of arrests, his team called for more demonstrations. People should support the opposition in a court in Moscow on Tuesday, his team wrote Monday morning on the Telegram news channel. The question is whether a previous suspended sentence against Navalny will turn into a true prison term. The 44-year-old man faces several years in prison.
Nawalny’s release had already drawn supporters Sunday in mass demonstrations in around 100 cities. Some observers said the protests were larger than the previous weekend, when hundreds of thousands participated. “Once again we have ensured that Alexei Navalny has tremendous national support,” his team wrote. The campaigns showed that “we are much stronger and braver than we think.”
Significantly more people were taken into police custody during the protests than before. The Owd-Info portal listed more than 5,100 arrests across the country Monday night. Most of them with more than 1,600 were in the capital Moscow. Authorities had largely cordoned off the center around the Kremlin to prevent protests. At night, subway stations were reopened and roads blocked for cars were opened.
Furthermore, according to human rights defenders, more than 60 journalists were detained. Navalny’s wife was released at night after being in police custody for hours. According to media reports, Julia Navalnaya is due to go to court this Monday morning for participating in unauthorized rallies. You face a fine or up to 15 days in prison.
Whether the Kremlin will comment on the protests is eagerly awaited Monday. A week ago, spokesman Dmitry Peskov spoke of “few people” on the streets. Authorities recently arrested prominent representatives of Nawalny’s team. According to commentators, the power apparatus had speculated that this would paralyze the protests. But that did not happen.
Navalny was the victim of an assassination attempt with the Novichok neurotoxin in Siberia in August. He blames a “killing squad” of the FSB national intelligence service under Putin’s orders. Putin and the FSB reject that.
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