Aleksei Navalny, ordered to return to Russia urgently, otherwise runs the risk of going to jail

The Russian Prison Service on Monday accused Aleksei Navalny of violating the terms of his suspended prison sentence because it could not be verified by judicial authorities. Navalny was sentenced to three and a half years in prison for robbery, a 2014 case that the dissident considers politically motivated. The deadline for judicial review expires on December 30 and Navalny is due to appear in court.

“The convict does not fulfill his obligations established by the court, eluding the supervision of the Criminal Inspection,” the Russian Prison Service was quoted as saying by Reuters.

Aleksei Navalny, who is in Germany, says he received a summons to appear in a Moscow court on Tuesday morning.

Kira Yarmysh, a spokesperson for the Russian opposition leader, says it is impossible for Navalny to return to Moscow on Tuesday. “It is absolutely impossible to get to the Moscow Criminal Inspectorate tomorrow. But does the Prison Service care about logic? They have been given an order and they are complying with it,” charged Kira Yarmysh.

Aleksei Navalny, a critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, became extremely ill on August 20 on a plane flying between the cities of Tomsk and Moscow after having tea at the airport before taking off. The plane’s pilots decided to make an emergency landing in the city of Omsk, where the Russian dissident received the first medical attention. Doctors in the city of Omsk said the dissident was not poisoned. However, German authorities have confirmed that Aleksei Navalny, who was transferred to a coma in Germany, was poisoned with a neurotoxic substance. Aleksei Navalny recovered a few weeks after the attack. Russia has denied any involvement in the incident.