More than 100 detained at Navalny memorials in Russia: Rights group | News

Police in Russia have detained greater than 100 individuals throughout the nation at memorials and rallies to honour opposition chief Alexey Navalny, who the authorities say died in a distant penal colony.

On Saturday, the OVD-Information protest monitoring group stated greater than 110 individuals had been arrested, together with 64 in Saint Petersburg.

The federal jail service stated that Navalny, 47, fell unconscious and died on Friday after a stroll on the “Polar Wolf” Arctic penal colony the place he was serving a 19-year sentence, prompting an outpouring of grief and shock amongst his supporters internationally and condemnation from world leaders.

As information of his loss of life unfold, spontaneous memorials happened in a number of city areas, with individuals taken into custody in 13 cities, in keeping with OVD-Information, which tracks political repression in Russia.

Eleven individuals had been detained within the capital, Moscow, and a number of other others within the cities of Nizhny Novgorod, Krasnodar, Rostov-on-Don and Tver, it added.

The a whole bunch of flowers and candles laid in Moscow on Friday for Navalny, a outstanding critic of President Vladimir Putin, had been principally taken away in a single day in black luggage. Just a few dozen roses and carnations remained within the snow on Saturday on the monument to the victims of Soviet repression, which sits within the shadow of the previous KGB headquarters on Lubyanka Sq. in central Moscow.

Movies and photographs shared on Russian social media additionally confirmed flowers being cleared from monuments to victims of Soviet-era repression throughout the nation.

Protests are unlawful in Russia below strict anti-dissent legal guidelines, and the authorities have clamped down notably harshly on rallies in help of Navalny.

Authorities within the capital stated on Friday they had been conscious of calls on-line “to participate in a mass rally within the centre of Moscow” and warned individuals towards attending.

On a bridge beside the Kremlin the place opposition chief and former prime minister Boris Nemtsov was shot useless on February 27, 2015, flowers had been additionally eliminated in a single day.

A makeshift vase of white and purple carnations remained with a small printed piece of paper. “Boris Nemtsov was shot within the again and murdered right here,” the notice stated.

On Saturday, police blocked entry to a memorial within the Siberian metropolis of Novosibirsk and detained a number of individuals there in addition to in one other Siberian metropolis, Surgut, OVD-Information stated.

Video shared on social media from Novosibirsk confirmed individuals sticking purple flowers within the snow as police blocked entry to the memorial with tape.

Putin’s ties with West

Navalny’s loss of life – which comes lower than a month earlier than a presidential election that’s sure to return Putin to a different six years in energy – can have little impact on the outcomes, stated Alexey Muraviev, professor of strategic research at Curtin College.

“Navalny didn’t have any important political weight in Russia. He had a military of supporters however in comparison with the general proportion of the Russian conservative voters they had been, and proceed to stay, a minority,” Muraviev advised Al Jazeera.

As a substitute, Muraviev added, this might hurt the Russian president’s try and re-establish a dialogue with the West with the renewed give attention to his repressive regime.

United States President Joe Biden stated Navalny “bravely stood as much as the corruption, the violence and all of the unhealthy issues the Putin authorities had been doing,” including that “Putin is chargeable for Navalny’s loss of life”.

European Council President Charles Michel stated the Russian dissident “fought for the values of freedom and democracy” and made the last word sacrifice.

“The EU holds the Russian regime for sole chargeable for this tragic loss of life,” he stated.

Australia’s International Minister Penny Wong on Saturday stated Navalny’s “heroic opposition to Putin’s repressive and unjust regime impressed the world”.

Wong posted on X: “We maintain the Russian Authorities solely chargeable for his remedy and loss of life in jail.”

The Kremlin – which has not commented on Navalny’s loss of life – has described Western leaders’ reactions as “completely unacceptable” and “hysterical”.

China’s overseas ministry declined to touch upon Saturday describing it as “Russia’s inside affair”, the AFP information company reported.

Navalny had been jailed since January 2021, when he returned to Moscow to face sure arrest after recuperating in Germany from nerve agent poisoning he blamed on the Kremlin. He was later convicted thrice, saying every case was politically motivated, and acquired a sentence of 19 years for extremism.

After the final verdict, Navalny stated he understood he was “serving a life sentence, which is measured by the size of my life or the size of lifetime of this regime”.

Hours after Navalny’s loss of life was reported, his spouse, Yulia Navalnaya, addressed the Munich Safety Convention in Germany the place many leaders had gathered.

“If that is true, I need Putin and everybody round Putin, Putin’s pals, his authorities to know that they may bear duty for what they did to our nation, to my household and to my husband. And today will come very quickly,” she stated.

Navalny’s mom, Lyudmila Navalnaya, was travelling to the jail colony the place he died, accompanied by his lawyer, the Novaya Gazeta newspaper reported on Saturday.