New York Rangers striker Artemi Panarin posted a photo on Instagram on Thursday showing support for Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who was arrested on Sunday several months after he was poisoned.
Panarin, a native Russian, posted a photo of Navalny, his wife and their two children with the caption “Navalny’s Freedom”.
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Navalny, an anti-corruption activist and the best-known critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, was arrested on Sunday when he returned from Germany to Russia, where he spent five months recovering from a nervous agent poisoning he attributes to the Kremlin.
Panarin declined to comment further on the post through a Rangers spokesman, ESPN reported.
This is not the first time that the alternative Rangers captain has spoken out against Putin. In a 2019 interview, he criticized the Russian president saying that he “no longer understands what is right and what is wrong”.
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“Psychologically, it is not easy for him to judge the situation soberly,” said Panarin at the time, via Sports Illustrated. “He has a lot of people who influence his decisions. But if everyone has been walking around you for 20 years saying that you are an amazing guy and how you are doing a great job, you will never see your mistakes.”
Panarin’s post comes just days before the planned protests against Navalny’s arrest.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.