Russian prosecutors seek to keep Navalny in prison despite protests

World

Published: 2021-02-01 18:08

Last Updated: 2024-03-29 12:25


Alexei Navalny. Credit: ABC
Alexei Navalny. Credit: ABC

Monday, the Russian Public Prosecutor's Office expressed support for the imprisonment of Alexei Navalny on the eve of a session in which the Russian dissident faces the possibility of imprisonment for two or three years.

Alexei Navalny will appear before the judiciary Tuesday for violating the conditions of judicial oversight. A suspended prison sentence issued against him in 2014 has also turned into a prison sentence with enforcement at the request of the prison authorities.

Navalny returned to Russia two weeks ago after five months of medical treatement in Germany after he was poisoned. Many believe Putin is behind it, but Moscow has denied the allegations.

On Monday, the Public Prosecution announced in a statement that it supports "this request as legal and justified."

Massive protests against his imprisonment have rocked Russia for the last two weeks.

This repression seen by police led to Western condemnations, with Paris calling on Berlin to abandon a huge gas pipeline project with Russia, as sanctions against it.

The "OVD-Info," a non-governmental organization specialized in following up on demonstrations, reported that more than 5,611 people were arrested during demonstrations across the country.

The organization added that the arrests took place outside the Russian capital, especially in St. Petersburg, where more than 1,300 demonstrators were arrested, and in Krasnoyarsk (Siberia) and Nizhny Novgorod (Volga), with about 200 protesters arrested.