Alexei Navalny, Russia’s leading figure detained by local police
Russia’s leading opposition figure and chief Kremlin critic, Alexei Navalny, was detained by local police on Sunday, moments after his return to the country.
He was taken away “by police officers at the border” without explanation, his spokesperson Kira Yarmysh tweeted. “The lawyer was not allowed to go with him, because just seconds ago ‘he passed the border.'”
Navalny and his wife Yulia were returning from a five-month stay in Germany, where he recovered from poisoning with military-grade nerve agent Novichok. They landed at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport just after 8 p.m. local time (12 p.m. ET), according to flight data information.
Standing in the airport after landing, Navalny told journalists, “This is the best day in the past five months.”
“Everyone is asking me if I’m scared. I am not afraid,” he added. “I feel completely fine walking towards the border control. I know that I will leave and go home because I’m right and all the criminal cases against me are fabricated.”
A perennial thorn in Russian President Vladimir Putin’s side, Navalny was placed on the country’s federal wanted list during his convalescence in Germany, in relation to a years-old fraud case that Navalany dismisses as politically motivated.
Last week, the Russian prison authority (FSIN) warned it would “to take all action to detain” Navalny.
The investigation also found that this unit, which included chemical weapons experts, had followed Navalny on more than 30 trips to and from Moscow since 2017. Russia denies involvement in Navalny’s poisoning. But several Western officials and Navalny himself have openly blamed Russia.
