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The hearing took place in a penal colony in Pokrov, about 70 miles from Moscow, where Navalny is already serving a two-and-a-half-year sentence for violating his parole.
It is not immediately clear whether the two sentences will be added up. Shaveddinov said that their legal team is trying to clarify that with the judge but suspect that the total sentence Navalny will have to serve will amount to roughly 12 years.
In this trial, the opposition leader was accused of disrespecting the court in the last year’s libel case against war veteran Ignat Artemenko as well as of large-scale fraud for allegedly misusing donations received by his anti-corruption foundation. Navalny and his team said the charges were fabricated to silence him and slammed the trials as a sham.
The prosecution had requested to transfer him to a maximum-security jail because he had committed “crimes” while in the prison camp.
His team is worried that this will reduce already limited access to Navalny as he is likely to be transferred to a far corner of the country.
“Without public protection, Alexei will be face to face with those who have already tried to kill him,” Navalny’s spokeswoman Kira Yarmysh tweeted ahead of the hearing. “And nothing will stop them from trying again. Therefore, we are now talking not only about Alexei’s freedom but also about his life.”
“It will be practically impossible to access it and keep contact with Alexei,” she added.
Navalny’s movement and his Anti-Corruption Foundation, which authored myriad investigations into the wealth of the Russian political elite including President Vladimir Putin himself, were labeled extremist and banned last year. Many of Navalny’s allies have fled the country to avoid persecution.
Yet, Navalny continues to speak out by sending messages via his legal team to be posted on his social media accounts that have amassed millions of followers. He also used the opportunity to say a final statement in court to criticize Putin, denounce the war in Ukraine, and urge Russians to protest it.
“The consequence of this war will be a breakdown, the collapse of our country,” Navalny said in a hearing on March 16, that was broadcast to journalists via patchy video link. “It sounds a little wild. But the phrase ‘Russo-Ukrainian War’ also sounds pretty wild.”
“You can’t lock up everyone. Go ahead, ask for 113 years [in prison] and give it to me — you won’t scare me or anybody else like me,” he added.
“Russia’s big, there are a lot of people here, and not everybody’s cowardly enough to betray their future and their children’s futures like you are,” he said, referring to the judge Margarita Kotova and the prosecution. A few days before the Tuesday hearing, Putin promoted Kotova by signing a presidential decree.
Navalny, a leading opposition figure in Russia, was poisoned in August 2020 using what European laboratories established to be military-grade nerve agent Novichok. After recovering in Germany, he returned to Russia in early 2021 and was immediately arrested, prompting mass protest in his support. The authorities launched an unprecedented crackdown on his supporters and his movement, which he has led since the late 2000s.
Navalny blamed the attack and subsequent persecution personally on Putin. The Kremlin repeatedly denied the accusations.
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