[ad_1]
After landing in Moscow, opposition politician Navalny was immediately arrested. There is great international horror at how the Kremlin continues to politically persecute the 44-year-old after an assassination attempt.
The Kremlin’s opponent, Alexei Navalny, was arrested at the airport after landing in Moscow. Police took the 44-year-old man at passport control. Officers secured his passport and Navalny said goodbye to his wife Julia. Apparently, his lawyer was unable to accompany him. According to informants, Navalny was taken to a nearby police station. His colleague Ivan Zhdanov tweeted this early Monday (local time).
The Russian law enforcement agency confirmed the arrest. He accuses Navalny of repeatedly violating the conditions of a five-year suspended sentence during his stay in Germany. Therefore, the opponent of the government must remain in detention pending a court decision. The prison system wants the trial sentence to become a real prison sentence.
Navalny’s team talks about a political staging to muzzle the prominent opponent of President Vladimir Putin. The trial is scheduled for January 29. The human rights organization Amnesty International issued a statement describing the arrest and subsequent detention as illegal. This is further proof that “the Russian authorities wanted to silence him.”
Navalny: return was never an option
The Kremlin critic had returned to his native Russia five months after being poisoned. Navalny’s flight from Berlin to Moscow had previously been unexpectedly diverted to another Moscow airport. The plane landed at Sheremetyevo airport, in the northwest of the city. Originally, the Pobeda airline plane was supposed to land at Vnukowo airport, southwest of Moscow, where numerous supporters had gathered to greet it.
Navalny made a brief statement shortly after his arrival. It was never a problem for him to return to Russia despite the poison attack on himself. “This is the only way to continue the fight,” he told press representatives. Navalny again described the Russian judiciary’s accusations against him as fabricated and unfounded.
The United States demands his release
The United States government has called for Nawalny’s immediate release. “The United States strongly condemns Russia’s decision to arrest Alexei Navalny,” US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Sunday night (local time). “We note with great concern that his arrest is the latest in a series of attempts to silence Navalny and other independent and opposition voices who are critical of the Russian authorities.” The Russian government must create a level playing field for all political parties and candidates who want to participate in the electoral process.
Scholz: illegal arrest
“The Russian authorities must accept the rights of Alexej Navalny and release him immediately,” said the representative of EU Foreign Affairs, Josep Borrell, on Twitter. EU Council President Charles Michel and Vice Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) also criticized the imprisonment as illegal. The Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania also demanded the immediate release of Navalny. The arrest was “completely unacceptable,” said a statement from the three EU and NATO countries bordering Russia. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is expected to speak about the case at a press conference on Monday.
Scholz called the arrest “illegal.” “This man has been wronged. There has been an assassination attempt against him and he must be protected by the state and not arrested,” said the finance minister on Sunday night in the “Bild” talk “The right questions.” He has the right “to move like a free man in Russia and request political mandates.” That should not lead to “the state authority doing everything against you.”
Criticism also came from the Greens in the Bundestag. The leader of the parliamentary group Katrin Göring-Eckardt wrote on Twitter: “The Kremlin clearly shows again how it deals with members of the opposition and wants to intimidate critics by all means.” Manuel Sarrazin, spokesman for Eastern Europe politics, declared: “The Kremlin and Vladimir Putin want to remove Alexei Navalny from circulation in this Duma election year at all costs.” The new parliament will be elected in September.
The leading deputy of the FDP parliamentary group, Alexander Graf Lambsdorff, criticized the “authoritarian course of the Russian president”. Putin is leading the country into a dead end. “The federal government must insist that Nawalny’s lawyers be explained the reasons for the arrest and that he himself be treated properly.” Navalny’s lawyer met Navalny at the airport, but was not allowed to accompany him.
The human rights organization Amnesty International classified the prominent opponent of President Vladimir Putin as a political prisoner of Russia.
Disturbances at the original arrival airport
The opposition leader had asked his followers to receive him in Moscow. The local prosecutor’s office warned of unauthorized demonstrations at the airport facilities and threatened consequences. Meanwhile, Russian security forces cracked down on supporters of Kremlin opponents who had gathered at Vnukovo airport. There were several arrests, as reported this Sunday by a reporter for the German Press Agency from the terminal.
Among those arrested are lawyer Lyubow Sobol, lawyer Alexej Molokoyedow and Navalny’s assistant Ilya Pachomov, Ivan Zhdanov of the Navalny anti-corruption foundation reported on Twitter. The reports also speak of the arrest of Navalny’s brother, Oleg. Other activists were also arrested. Uniformed men pushed back the people who wanted to receive the opposition politician. The OMON special police, which specializes in counterterrorism operations, had taken up positions with several prisoner transporters.
Russia, Moscow: Police officers standing in the terminal of Moscow Vnukovo airport. Navalny was originally supposed to land there, so there were riots. (Source: Pavel Golovkin / AP / dpa)
Navalny blames Putin for the attack
Since Navalny’s announcement that he would return to Russia, suspicions have arisen that he will be arrested immediately after landing. This was also announced by the Russian law enforcement agency. The government opponent had said before the flight took off that he was not afraid of being arrested because he was innocent. Therefore, an arrest is “impossible”.
Navalny also thanked the Federal Republicwhere he had been treated after the poison attack. His wife Julia was on board the plane. The opposition leader blamed a “assassin squad” from the FSB’s national intelligence agency operating under the orders of Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin for the August attack. In December, Navalny posted a phone call with one of the alleged perpetrators, who admitted to the attack.
Russia denies that there was a crime and therefore refuses to investigate until there is evidence. Germany had recently responded to several requests for mutual legal assistance in the case. Russia criticized this on Sunday as insufficient.
Navalny awaits an investigation into the poisoning
However, laboratories in the German armed forces, as well as in France, Sweden and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) proved to be the illegal warfare agent Novichok. Navalny hopes that when he returns to Russia, an investigation into his poisoning will be opened.
Navalny has now been arrested on charges of failing to comply with parole requirements in a previous criminal case. He always noted that he was recovering from the attack in Germany and therefore could not personally present himself to the authorities in Moscow. Russia’s law enforcement agency had put him up for wanted.
Navalny: The fight against the “Putin system” is only possible in Russia
Alexei Navalny had repeatedly emphasized that the political struggle against the “Putin system” could only continue in Russia itself, despite the risk of being imprisoned or killed. Critics of the Kremlin are repeated victims of attacks. In 2015, former Deputy Prime Minister Boris Nemtsov was shot near the Kremlin. Navalny faces several criminal proceedings in Russia that have been criticized for being politically motivated.
Numerous commentators described Navalny’s decision to return to Russia as courageous and a political victory. “The fact that Navalny is not afraid of a worst-case scenario destroys the entire Kremlin game,” wrote political scientist Tatiana Stanovaya. In the autumn there will be parliamentary elections in Russia, in which the opposition politician wants to break the monopoly of the Kremlin party, United Russia.
Russia’s best-known opposition activist collapsed on a domestic flight to Moscow after the August 20 attack. After an emergency landing in the Siberian city of Omsk, he was first treated by Russian doctors and then taken to the Berlin Charité University Clinic on August 22. After his discharge from the clinic, Navalny stayed in Germany for rehabilitation.
