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Silenced Kremlin critics infographic
Graphic shows what happens to Putin’s most vocal opponents.
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CRIME

Call to Russians not to give up after Navalny’s death

By Duncan Mil

February 22, 2024 - Russian opposition figure Alexey Navalny is just one of many Kremlin critics to have fallen foul of President Vladimir Putin’s rule.

Russian authorities said Navalny, 47, had died in an Arctic prison on Friday. Dissidents in exile are urging Russians to continue with their battle against President Vladimir Putin’s dictatorial rule.

Three days after her husband’s death, Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya, posted a video vowing to continue her husband’s fight “for the freedom of our country.”

“Yulia has changed everything,” Marat Gelman, a Russian art collector now living in Berlin, told AFP. Gelman believes that Navalnaya could be an even more influential figure than her husband because she is a woman.

“Putin’s machismo works well with men, but it does not work with women. The face of anti-war Russia must be that of a woman,” Gelman said.

According to Maria Kuznetova of OVD-Info -- a Russian human rights and media group -- Russia was on the path to becoming a one-party state, or autocracy under Putin, well before the February 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

OVD-Info estimates that the Russian state has detained more than 19,800 people for their “anti-war” stance since the invasion, Kuznetova noted.

Russia has also charged 894 individuals in criminal cases for “anti-war activity,” spreading of “fake news”, and “discrediting” Russia’s armed forces.

Navalny supporters are calling on people to head to the polls on March 17, the final day of Russia’s presidential election, in a show of strength against Putin.

Sources
PUBLISHED: 22/02/2024; STORY: Graphic News; PICTURES: Getty Images
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