Alexei Navalny says ‘Putin the Poisoner’ wants to imprison him ‘to scare millions’

Allies of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny called for immediate protests today after the Kremlin critic was sentenced to two-and-a-half years in prison for violating the terms of a 2014 conviction.  

Following the sentence, Navalny’s allies called for an immediate protest in Moscow’s Manezhnaya Square. Large numbers of police have been deployed to positions across the capital and other cities.

Navalny told his wife Yulia, ‘Don’t be sad, everything will be fine,’ after his verdict was read out, according to Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta. 

The 44-year-old dissident was tried today for breaking the terms of a 2014 embezzlement conviction, for which he was sentenced to three-and-a-half years. The Moscow court today ordered Navalny serve his original sentence in a penal colony, minus the one year he already spent under house arrest.  

As guards escorted the 44-year-old away to prison, British Foreign Minister Dominic Raab demanded the ‘perverse ruling’ be reversed.     

‘The UK calls for the immediate and unconditional release of Alexey Navalny and all of the peaceful protesters and journalists arrested over the last two weeks,’ said Mr Raab.

‘Today’s perverse ruling, targeting the victim of a poisoning rather than those responsible, shows Russia is failing to meet the most basic commitments expected of any responsible member of the international community.’

US President Joe Biden’s Secretary of State Antony Blinken echoed Raab’s calls for Navalny’s release, saying the verdict was deeply concerning. 

‘We reiterate our call for the Russian government to immediately and unconditionally release Mr. Navalny, as well as the hundreds of other Russian citizens wrongfully detained in recent weeks for exercising their rights, including the rights to freedom of expression and of peaceful assembly,’ Blinken said. 

German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas echoed Raab’s joined the growing calls against the opposition leader’s jailing, accusing Russia of delivering a ‘bitter blow’ to democracy. 

Earlier today Navalny mocked Putin by giving him the nickname ‘Vladimir the Poisoner of Underwear’ and told a judge his trial is only taking place because the Russian leader had failed to kill him with Novichok.  

Navalny told the Russian courthouse that Putin is ‘demanding to steal underwear from opponents and smear them with chemical weapons’.   

He also said Putin wanted him imprisoned to ‘scare millions’ and warned the President that ‘people will realise.’

The Vladimir Putin critic was arrested last month for violating the probation terms of a 2014 embezzlement conviction.

His detention has sparked weekends of demonstrations by tens of thousands of protesters across Russia. 

Today, 354 Navalny supporters were hauled away by riot police as he faced down a representative of the Federal Penitentiary Service (FSIN) inside the Moscow courthouse. 

‘It’s easy to lock me up,’ Navalny said in his closing statement during his trial, reports The Moscow Times. ‘The main thing in this process is to intimidate a huge number of people, this is how it works. They are putting one person behind bars to scare millions.

He continued: ‘I really hope that this process will be perceived as a sign of weakness.’  

Warning Putin about his actions, Navalny added: ‘You can’t put millions and hundreds of thousands in jail — and I hope people will begin to realize that. Once they do — and this moment will come — you won’t be able to jail everyone.’ 

Navalny said the ‘elephant in the room’ is that his trial is only taking place because he ‘offended’ Putin for surviving the Novichok poisoning. 

‘We know why this is happening,’ he said. ‘The reason is the hatred and fear of one man in a bunker. Because I offended him by surviving after they tried to kill me on his orders.

‘No matter how much [Putin] tries to pose as a geopolitician, his main resentment toward me is that he will go down in history as a poisoner.’

Mocking the Russian President, Navalny continued: ‘There was Alexander the Liberator and Yaroslav the Wise. Now we’ll have Vladimir the Poisoner of Underpants.

‘The police are guarding me and half of Moscow is cordoned off because we have shown that he is demanding to steal underwear from opponents and smear them with chemical weapons.’  

Navalny faces three-and-a-half years in jail if the judge, who is now deliberating their verdict, decides to trigger the suspended sentence handed down following his 2014 money-laundering trial.

Navalny rejects the conviction as politically motivated and believes the suspended sentence has been resurrected to gag him. 

The verdict is expected to be returned at 8pm (5pm GMT) according to the Mediazona news website.   

His defence lawyer Vadim Kobsev likened Navalny’s poisoning to a ‘political Chernobyl’ and ended his speech with a quote from the TV series ‘Chernobyl’. 

He said: ‘Legasov says: ‘Dyatlov broke all the rules and brought  the reactor to self-destruction. Nobody in that control room knew that the shutdown button would act as a detonator.’ Dear judge, don’t be like Dyatlov, don’t push the button.’ 

Navalny shot down accusations he broke terms of his parole, arguing that he ‘was in a coma’ at the time.

His defence team argue that for much of the period which the penitentiary service says he was in breach, he was in a coma at the hospital in Berlin, telling the judge today that the ‘the whole world knew where he was.’ The opposition leader says he was poisoned by the Kremlin.  

The FSIN official claimed that he’d failed to supply documents to provide ‘serious reasons for not showing up’ to parole appointments in person.

‘I was in a coma!’ Navalny replied. ‘Comrade captain, do you respect the Russian President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin? … You said you don’t know where I’ve been since August. Putin said on television that thanks to him I’d been sent to Germany for treatment.’

‘I was in a coma, then I was in the ICU,’ he continued. ‘I sent you medical documents. You had my address and contacts. What else could I have done to tell you where I am? I have a lawyer and my lawyer has a telephone. How could I have informed you better?’ 

The FSIN official asked the judge to replace Navalny’s suspended sentence with a real sentence, adding they are willing to count the 12 months that he had spent under house arrest toward the sentence. This would mean he would face a maximum prison sentence of two-and-a-half years. 

‘The court showed unprecedented lenience towards Alexei Navalny despite the gravity of his crime by giving him suspended sentences,’ the official said. ‘However, Navalny, despite the humanism the court expressed toward him, continued to violate the terms of his probation.’ 

The case presents one of the most serious challenges to the Kremlin in years and has led to calls for new Western sanctions against Putin’s government. 

The Kremlin said today it wasn’t following the court proceedings, adding that it hoped the ‘nonsense’ would not lead the European Union to draw any ‘foolish’ conclusions.

Diplomats from the United States, Britain, Bulgaria, Poland, Latvia, Lithuania and other European countries attended, according to local media.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said this ‘isn’t just meddling in the internal affairs of a sovereign state, but the self-incrimination of the West’s unsightly and illegal attempts to contain Russia.’

Navalny was seen standing inside the glass-panelled dock wearing a black hoodie as he spoke with his lawyer Olga Mikhailova. 

When asked by the judge to state where he lived, Navalny joked that he resided at the Matrosskaya Tishina prison. 

He also demanded that journalists be allowed inside the courtroom. Reporters have only been allowed to watch a live video feed from a separate room.  

Navalny’s defence say that while he was recovering from the Novichok poisoning he was unable to register with Russian authorities in person as required by the terms of his probation.

But prison officials told the court he failed to make himself known to them while going about his business in Germany. 

A representative for the Federal Penitentiary Service (FSIN) said: ‘Since the end of September 2020, Navalny has been in outpatient treatment. Judging by media reports, he moved freely and gave interviews.

‘He did not contact FSIN inspectors, although their phone number was posted on their website. He was put on the wanted list, as the service decided that he was systematically evading a suspended sentence.’ 

Navalny replied: ‘Comrade captain, do you respect the Russian President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin? … You said you don’t know where I’ve been since August. Putin said on television that thanks to him I’d been sent to Germany for treatment.’

‘I was in a coma, then I was in the ICU,’ he continued. ‘I sent you medical documents. You had my address and contacts. What else could I have done to tell you where I am? I have a lawyer and my lawyer has a telephone. How could I have informed you better?’

Navalny’s lawyer Vadim Kobzev added: ‘The whole country, the whole world knew where he was.’  

Navalny, who in the last decade has emerged as Putin’s most prominent domestic critic, believes the 2014 case was retribution by the authorities for his political activities.

They say the Kremlin is now resurrecting it to muzzle him. 

His arrest on January 17 sparked massive protests across Russia over the past two weekends.

Tens of thousands have taken to the streets to demand his release, chanting slogans against Putin.

Police detained more than 5,750 people during Sunday’s rallies, including more than 1,900 in Moscow, the biggest number the nation has seen since Soviet times. Some were beaten.

Most were released after being handed court summons and face fines or jail terms of between seven and 15 days.

Several people faced criminal charges over alleged violence against police.

Navalny’s team has called for another demonstration Tuesday outside the Moscow court building.

Police were deployed in force near the court building and cordoned off nearby streets, making random detentions.

While he has never held elected office, Navalny has made a name for himself with anti-graft investigations exposing the wealthy lifestyles of Russia’s elite. 

Two days after he was placed in pre-trial custody last month, his team released an investigation into an opulent Black Sea residence Navalny claims was given to Putin through a billion-dollar scheme financed by close associates who head state companies.

The video has been viewed over 100 million times, fuelling discontent as ordinary Russians struggle with an economic downturn and the coronavirus pandemic. 

Putin insisted last week that neither he nor his relatives own any of the properties mentioned in the video, and his long time confidant, construction magnate Arkady Rotenberg, claimed that he owns it.  

As part of efforts to crush the protests, the authorities have targeted Navalny’s associates and activists across the country.

His brother Oleg, top ally Lyubov Sobol and several others were put under house arrest for two months and face criminal charges of violating coronavirus restrictions. 

The United States and the European Union have called for Navalny’s immediate release and denounced police violence on demonstrators.

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell is expected to raise the issue of Navalny during a visit this week to Moscow.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has responded by saying the case is a ‘domestic affair’ and that ‘we will not allow anyone to interfere in it.’