Alexei Navalny

About

Alexei Navalny was a Russian activist and politician. He achieved recognition for his video documentaries exposing corruption among Russian political elites which he published on YouTube. As of February 2021, Alexei Navalny's YouTube channel had more than 6.4 millions subscribers and over a billion combined views, and over 2.5 million followers on Twitter.

Often considered an opposition leader in Russian politics, Alexei Navalny had been described as "the man Vladimir Putin fears most" by the Wall Street Journal in 2013.^[1] In August 2020, Navalny gained international attention following his poisoning attempt and subsequent recovery.

In February 2021, Navalny was imprisoned in Russia, with his initial 2.5 year sentence later increased by 9 years and then by 19 years. In February 2024, Navalny died in prison aged 47, with many putting the blame for his death on Putin's regime.

History

On September 9, 2011, Alexei Navalny founded the Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK for short),^[2] a Moscow-based non-profit organization working on exposing corruption among Russian officials. On July 6, 2013, Navalny launched his YouTube channel, which since released more than 400 hundreds videos exposing corruption in Russian politics and covering other topics. Notably, on March 2nd, 2017, Navalny released "He Is Not Dimon To You", a 50-minute documentary investigating Dmitry Medvedev, the former President of Russia and the Prime Minister of Russia at the time of the video's release.^[3] As of February 2024, this documentary gathered more than 46 million views.

On January 19, 2021, Navalny's YouTube channel released the documentary "Putin's palace. History of World's Largest Bribe". The documentary explored the construction of Residence at Cape Idokopas, a large extravagant complex built on the shores of the Black Sea allegedly belonging to Vladimir Putin.^[4] The documentary estimated the price of the palace at 1.35 billion US dollars. As of February 2024, the video accumulated over 129 million views.

2020 Poisoning

Poisoning Attempt and Recovery

On August 20, 2020, Alexei Navalny became suddenly very ill in the middle of a flight from Tomsk to Moscow. He was quickly hospitalized in Omsk after an emergency landing ^[5]. Due to Navalny being a political enemy of Vladimir Putin, the sudden event was quickly considered as an assassination attempt by Navalny's family and associates and gained international attention. Navalny's family and aides alleged the quick hospitalization was an attempt at a cover-up by the Russian government. On August 21, a medical plane chartered by German NGO Cinema For Peace arrived in Omsk in order to transfer Alexei Navalny in the Charité hospital in Berlin, but the transfer was delayed by the doctors in Omsk who claimed Navalny's condition was too critical to transport him by plane ^[6]. They later came back on their claims, stating Alexei Navalny's condition was stable enough, and Navalny arrived in Germany on August 22 ^[7]. Two days later, the doctors at the Charité hospital concluded that Navalny had been poisoned, having found cholinesterase inhibitors (substances notably found in pesticids and nerve agents) ^[8]. On September 2, German chancellor Angela Merkel claimed that a testing by a German special military laboratory showed that Navalny had been poisoned with novichok, a nerve agent reportedly developed in the Soviet Union ^[9]. The same nerve agent already came into the spotlight in 2018 due to the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal in England.

After weeks of care, Alexei Navalny eventually recovered. He was taken out of an induced coma on September 7 and was responsive to stimuli ^[10]. On September 15, one week later, he posted a picture of himself along with his family on his Instagram account (shown below). The same day, his spokeswoman claimed he would eventually return to Russia ^[11].

Four days later, Alexei Navalny posted another picture of himself on Instagram on September 19, where he can be seen going down stairs, showing improvement of his condition. The picture was accompanied with a short text describing his difficulties at the time, such as being unable to use a phone or struggling to drink a glass of water.

On October 1st, Alexei Navalny claimed he believed the poisoning was ordered by Vladimir Putin himself, stating that only three people in Russia were able to give orders regarding a poisoning by novichok, all three needing orders from Putin first ^[12]. The whole incident drew international attention and became a trending topic on several online boards, notably on Reddit, most specifically on r/worldnews and r/europe. It was also condemned by most of Western leaders ^[13]. While acknowledging the gravity of the incident, then President Donald Trump initally casted doubt on the suggestion that the Russian government was behind the assassination attempt, suggesting China may be the culprit ^[14].

The "Underwear Plot"

On November 14, one month and an half later, an investigation led The Insider and Bellingcat, also helped by the German newspaper Der Spiegel and CNN, concluded that the FSB (Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation) was behind the assassination attempt ^[15]. On December 17, Vladimir Putin publicly asserted that the poisoning allegations were "falsification" during an end-of-the-year press conference ^[16]. As reported on December 21, Alexei Navalny managed to phone one of the FSB agents linked to the attempt, Konstantin Kudryavtsev, and pretended to be a senior official from the FSB headquarters who wanted more details from the operation ^[17]. During the phone call, which was released online (see below), Navalny learned that the nerve agent was applied on his underwear, specifically on the insides around the crotch area.

Following this revelation, both the failed assassination attempt and the underwear detail became targets of mockery by Russian online users, notably on Twitter ^[18].

Return to Russia in 2021

Arrest

On January 14, Russia's Federal Prison Service (FSIN) stated that it was "obliged to take all actions to detain" Alexei Navalny on his return home, as Navalny leaving Russia as a consequence of his poisoning was a violation of a court sentence he received in 2014 ^[19]. Despite this warning, Alexei Navalny returned by plane Russia on January 17 as he initially planed, but was quickly arrested and placed into custody ^[20].

As a consequence, the Putin's palace documentary (see above), which was published on January 19 on YouTube, starts with a short summary of the events that occurred following Navalny's return and encourages Russian citizens to protest in the streets starting from January 23. This summary is followed by a short video of Alexei Navalny himself, recorded while he was still in Gemarny, where he explains the timing of the documentary. He notably states that the Anti-corruption Foundation was still working on it while Navalny was in intensive care and that he and his associates agreed to release the documentary after Navalny's return to Russia to show that they were not afraid to attack Putin.

Protests and Imprisonment

Protests erupted all across Russia as soon as January 23, with more than 2,500 protesters being arrested the same day ^[21]. The protests continued while Navalny's trial was being held, and as of February 1st, more than 5000 people were behind detained with a majority of them being from Moscow ^[22]. On February 3, Alexei Navalny was sentenced to 2 years and 8 months in prison for violating his 2014 court sentence, a decision which was immediatly condemned by most international observers and followed by more protests ^[23]. Before the sentencing, Navalny delivered a scathing speech condemning Putin while ironizing on the assassination attempt: "We all remember Alexander the Liberator and Yaroslav the Wise. Now we’ll have Vladimir the Poisoner of Underpants". Reports suggests that the amount of detainees as a consequence of the protests were overwhelming Moscow's jails by February 5 ^[24].

On August 4th, 2023, Moscow City Court sentenced Navalny to an additional nine years of prison on charges of large-scale fraud and holding court in contempt. On August 4th, 2023, Navalny was sentenced to an additional 19 years of prison on charges of forming an extremist organization and funding extremism.

Death

During the period of his arrest and imprisonment, Navalny was placed into the punishment isolation cell, the most sever form of legal punishment for inmates in Russian prisons, a total of 27 times, spending a total of 308 days in the cell.^[25] In January 2023, Navalny experienced sever fever during a SHIZO sentence, with over 300 Russian medical professionals signing an open letter to Vladimir Putin, asking to stop putting the prisoner into harsh conditions.

In December 2023, Navalny's was transported to a prison in Kharp, where he was put into SHIZO a total of four times.

On February 16th, 2024, at approximately 11:50am, 47-year-old Navalny lost consciousness during a walk outside. A medical brigade failed to resuscitate the prisoner, logging the time of death at 12:17pm.

In the following hours, media worldwide reported on Navalny's death. Many politicians worldwide along with users on social media put the blame for Navalny's death on Vladimir Putin's regime.^[26]

The news of Alexei Navalny's death was followed by reactions from world leaders (examples shown below) and by protests by Russian migrants held in cities worldwide.^[27]

Search Interest

External References