The body of
Alexei Navalny ,
Vladimir Putin
's top opponent
who was found dead on February 16 in a Russian prison,
was delivered this Saturday to his mother
.
"Alexei's body was delivered to his mother. We thank those who asked for him with us," spokesperson Kira Yarmish said on the X social network.
The Russian president's main opponent died on February 16 in a prison in northern Siberia, where he was serving a 19-year sentence on charges widely seen as political retaliation.
Since last week,
the Russian authorities have refused to hand over Navalny's body to his mother
, Lyudmila Navalnaya, who traveled to the city of Salekhard, in the Yamalia-Nenetsia region, near the prison colony where the opponent died.
Navalny's team indicated on Friday that they had filed a lawsuit to have the body handed over to them, claiming that local investigators threatened to bury him on prison grounds if his mother did not agree to hold a "secret" funeral.
Alexei Navalny was Putin's main opponent.
Photo EFE.
"An hour ago, an investigator called Alexei's mother and gave her an ultimatum: either he accepts a secret burial, without public obsequies, or Alexei will be buried in the penal colony," Yarmish said last Thursday.
"He refuses to negotiate with the Investigative Committee because they do not have the authority to decide when and how his son will be buried," he added.
Yarmish said Saturday that plans for the funeral are still unclear.
Lyudmila Navalnaya, Alexei Navalny's mother, received her son's body.
Reuters Photo
"We do not know if the authorities will interfere to carry it out as the family wishes and as Alexei deserves," the spokesperson reported.
Navalny's team previously said that the Kremlin is trying to block public funerals that could mobilize the opponent's supporters.
Who was Alexei Navalny
Navalny was the
main opponent of Putin's government,
whom he accused of subverting his country's post-Soviet democracy to remain in power.
Alexei Navalny arrested at a protest in Russia in 2019. Photo AFP
Despite repeated arrests and attacks, Navalny remained an unwavering critic of Putin, who, according to Navalny, skimmed off Russia's oil profits to enrich his friends and entourage in the security services, and then used that influence to stay in power.
Navalny
used street politics
and social media to build a tenacious opposition movement, even after much of the independent media in Russia was crushed and other critics were driven into exile or killed in unsolved homicides.
Prisoner since 2021
Navalny had been behind bars since January 2021, when he returned to Moscow after recovering in Germany from a nerve agent poisoning that he blamed on the Kremlin.
Since then, he received
three prison sentences
, all of which he rejected as politically motivated.
Western leaders and others who have opposed Putin's government praised Navalny's bravery.
The opposition leader's health had recently deteriorated and the cause of his death remains unknown, but many world leaders said they held Russian authorities ultimately responsible for his death.
“His death in a Russian prison and a man's fixation and fear only underscore the weakness and rot at the heart of the system Putin has built.
“Russia is responsible for this,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said during a conference in Germany.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Navalny “has probably now paid with his life for this courage.”
Russians leave flowers on the ninth day after the death of Alexei Navalny.
Photo EFE
Before his arrest, Navalny campaigned against official corruption, organized major anti-Kremlin protests and ran for public office.
This Saturday, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Saturday that "truly powerful leaders" like Russian President Vladimir Putin "do not assassinate their opponents."
"Putin pretends to be powerful, but truly powerful leaders do not murder their opponents," Trudeau declared at a press conference in Kiev with the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, on the occasion of the second anniversary of the Russian invasion of this country.