As of: February 19, 2024, 12:43 p.m
By: Simon Schröder
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Putin's supporters are spreading propaganda on social media surrounding Navalny's death.
They see a connection between Carlson's interview and Navalny.
Putin should not be to blame.
Moscow – Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny is dead. Margarita Simonyan, editor-in-chief of the Russian propaganda channel
Russia Today,
now sees an unusual connection between Tucker Carlson's Vladimir Putin interview and Navalny's death.
As Putin's harshest critic and activist, Navalny had long been declared Putin's number one public enemy.
After Navalny barely survived a poison attack in the summer of 2020, the activist traveled back to his home country and was promptly arrested.
He died in custody on February 16, 2024.
Putin's top propagandist: "Navalny should not rest in peace"
Simonyan, in 2021, called Navalny a “traitor to the fatherland” and that he deserved to die.
According to
The Daily Beast
, Simonyan now posted on
In response to NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg's statement that Russia must answer all serious questions about the circumstances of his death, the propagandist wrote: "Russia doesn't owe anyone anything, let's start with that."
Commemoration of the late Kremlin opponent Alexei Navalny.
His body is said to have been taken to Salekhard, Siberia.
© Kirsty Wigglesworth/dpa
Conspiracy theories and propaganda: Navalny died in retaliation for Carlson's interview
Simonyan's theory as to why the Kremlin critic suddenly died in custody is surprising.
It is not Putin who is said to have initiated an assassination attempt, but apparently the West in retaliation for Putin's interview with the hard-right US presenter Tucker Carlson.
A Telegram post she shared said: “This is retaliation for the interview.
Luckily it wasn't Carlson."
The 43-year-old did not go into the details of who, how and why the West is said to have killed Navalny.
Tucker Carlson, former host of the right-wing conservative US news channel Fox News, was the first Western journalist to interview President Vladimir Putin since the start of the Ukraine war.
Carlson received strong criticism from Europe and the United States that he was serving as Putin's puppet by uncritically spreading the Kremlin narrative.
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In a panel at the World Government Summit on February 12, Tucker Carlson also commented on Navalny and the suppression of press freedom in Russia.
When asked why he had not asked Putin about this, he replied: “Every leader kills people, even my head,” and the lack of press freedom in Russia is widely reported in the Western media.
Hundreds of protesters were arrested in response to Navalny's death
The suppression of freedom of the press and freedom of expression also became clear at the weekend.
In response to Navalny's death, thousands of Russians protested with flowers to pay tribute to Navalny.
The
New York Times
reported that at least 366 people were arrested after symbolically expressing sympathy for Navalny's death.
A passerby told the
New York Times
: “They fear Navalny in prison, they fear Navalny in death, they fear the people who put flowers on the stone here.”
Other propagandists also saw connections between Navalny's death and the West's intentions.
Nikolai Starikov judged Navalny's death to be a very "convenient moment for the Western puppeteers," according to
The Daily Beast
.
In particular, Starikov sees a connection to undermine Carlson's interview and give the US Congress more incentive to pass the aid package for Ukraine.
The exact circumstances surrounding Navalny's death will probably never be clear.
Russia is currently refusing to hand over Navalny's body to his family.
(Simon Schröder)