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A still image taken from video shows law enforcement officers speaking with Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny before taking him to Sheremetyevo Airport in Moscow, Russia, on January 17, 2021. REUTERS / Reuters TV
MOSCOW – Prominent Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny was detained by police upon his arrival in Moscow on Sunday after he flew home to Russia from Germany for the first time since he was poisoned last summer, sparking a political clash with the West.
The move, which could land Navalny in jail for 3.5 years for allegedly disobeying the terms of a suspended prison sentence, may reignite political pressure on the West to toughen sanctions on Russia, especially against an $ 11 bill. 6 billion to build a gas pipeline from Russia to Germany.
In a case that attracted international attention, Navalny was poisoned last summer by what German military tests showed he was a Novichok nerve agent, a version of events that the Kremlin rejects.
Navalny recovered in Germany and after he said last week that he planned to return home, the Moscow Prison Service (FSIN) said it would do everything possible to arrest him once he returned, accusing him of disobeying the terms of a prison sentence. suspended for embezzlement. The 2014 case, he says, was made up.
But the 44-year-old opposition politician laughed and joked with journalists on his plane, saying he was not afraid and did not believe he would be arrested.
Four masked policemen asked Navalny to accompany him to passport control at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport, before he formally entered Russia. They did not explain why. Navalny, after kissing his wife Yulia on the cheek, left with them.
Navalny supporters have said that jailing one of President Vladimir Putin’s most prominent internal critics could make him a Nelson Mandela-like figure and an increasingly popular symbol of resistance to the Kremlin.
The Kremlin, which only refers to him as the “Berlin patient,” laughs at that. Putin’s allies point to opinion polls that show the Russian leader is far more popular than Navalny, whom they call a blogger rather than a politician.
Minutes before being arrested, Navalny had said: “I am not afraid. I know that I am right. I know that all criminal cases against me are fabricated. “
Navalny says Putin was behind his poisoning. The Kremlin denies its involvement. He says he has seen no evidence that he was poisoned.
Poisoning
Navalny’s plane from Berlin was diverted to Sheremetyevo airport from another Moscow airport at the last minute for a technical reason in an apparent effort by authorities to frustrate journalists and supporters who were greeting him.
The Moscow FSIN said in a statement that Navalny had been detained due to alleged violations of his suspended prison sentence and that he would be in custody until a court hearing later this month that will decide whether to convert his suspended sentence into an actual sentence of 3.5 years in jail.
Navalny also faces potential problems in three other criminal cases, all of which he says are politically motivated.
His arrest led to an immediate conviction abroad.
US President-elect Joe Biden’s incoming national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, said on Twitter: “Mr. Navalny must be released immediately and the perpetrators of the scandalous attack on his life must be held accountable. “
The US opposition to the pipeline project, Nord Stream 2, is bipartisan and Biden has described the pipeline as a “bad deal” for Europe.
Charles Michel, president of the European Council, demanded the immediate release of Navalny. Lithuania, a member of the European Union, said on Sunday that it would ask the European Union to quickly impose new sanctions on Russia, and Czech Foreign Minister Tomas Petricek said he wanted the EU to discuss possible sanctions.
Frustrated supporters
Russian authorities will be watching closely in the coming days to see if Navalny’s arrest triggers large public protests.
Tatiana Stanovaya, director of the political analysis firm R.Politik, said her arrest showed that the Kremlin’s hardline was on the rise.
“He (Navalny) has gone from being a little thug to becoming an enemy who must be humiliated, crushed and punished,” he wrote on the Telegram messaging application.
Navalny, accompanied by his wife, spokesperson and lawyer, flew from Berlin on a flight operated by Russian airline Pobeda, owned by the state-controlled Aeroflot.
His supporters gathered at Moscow’s Vnukovo airport despite cold weather and more than 4,500 new coronavirus cases a day in the Russian capital.
The decision of the authorities to change the airport to Sheremetyevo airport frustrated them.
OVD-Info, a monitoring group, said police had detained 53 people in Moscow and five in St. Petersburg.
The Moscow prosecutor’s office, which had officially warned 15 pro-Navalny organizers, had said that meeting him en masse was illegal because he was not sanctioned by the authorities.
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