- Alexei Navalny, the main critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, was arrested on Monday after his return to Russia after an assassination attempt.
- Navalny was arrested at a Moscow airport after disembarking from Berlin, with police officers accusing him of violating the terms of a 2014 suspended sentence for embezzlement.
- Navalny was poisoned with the nervous agent Novichok on August 20, and was soon flown to Berlin for specialized treatment.
- A hearing held at a police station on Monday saw Navalny in custody until February 15.
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Alexei Navalny, the main critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, was arrested after returning to Moscow for the first time after an attempt on his life last summer.
Navalny was poisoned by the nervous agent Novichok shortly before flying from Tomsk, Siberia, to Moscow on August 20. He was evacuated to Berlin for specialized care, where he remained until Sunday.
Navalny accused Putin of approving the attack. A consortium of journalists, including CNN and Bellingcat, found that the assassination attempt was carried out by officials from the FSB, Russia’s spy agency.
Navalny landed at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport on Sunday and was immediately arrested by police who accused him of violating the terms of a 2014 suspended sentence for embezzlement.
On Monday afternoon, a hearing held at a Moscow police station saw Navalny in custody until February 15, Navalny’s lawyer, Vadim Kobzev, told the state news agency Interfax.
Navalny called the hearing “the ultimate form of illegality,” Interfax reported.
The hearing was held at a police station, not in an official court, because Navalny had not yet tested negative for COVID-19, according to the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs.
This video posted on social media showed the moment when crowds shouted for Navaly as he left the police station.
—Медиазона (@mediazzzona) January 18, 2021
A second hearing will take place on Monday to discuss the freezing of Navalny’s assets and properties, tweeted Ivan Zhdanov, director of the Navalny Anti-Corruption Foundation.
Police officers seen outside the police station holding Alexei Navalny in Khimki, just outside Moscow, on January 18, 2021.
ANDREY BORODULIN / AFP via Getty Images)
On Monday, Navalny’s spokesman Kira Yarmish shared a video on YouTube recorded by Navalny some time before his sentence.
“What are these bunker residents most afraid of? You know what they are afraid of, they are mainly afraid of people going out into the streets,” he said.
Navalny went on to accuse the Russian state of trying to assassinate him.
“This band of thieves who have been robbing the country for 20 years told me, and to everyone who refuses to keep quiet, that we were trying to kill you, but you didn’t die and, as such, offended us.” he said.
“That is why we will now put you in prison. And now a woman in black clothes will come who symbolizes a judge and will send me to prison, while realizing that this is absolutely and totally against the law.”
Leonid Volkov, a collaborator close to Navalny, declared that a mass protest in support of his cause would take place on January 23, The Moscow Times reported.