Russian authorities have said that the opposition activist Aleksei Navalny died of natural causes while in prison in a far northern Arctic penal colony. It comes nearly a full week after Russian prison services announced he died on Feb.16.
There's now a public fight over his body, and the question of a funeral service, as his family and legal team have complained they are being denied access to the deceased. Condemnations have come in from various Western countries, and have pointed at the Putin government, ultimately blaming the Kremlin for his death while in custody. This has included US and European officials.
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| Yulia Navalnaya, widow of Alexei Navalny |
Navalny's mother, Lyudmila Navalnaya, has newly accused Russian officials of seeking to pressure her into accepting a secret burial, presumably to prevent it from becoming a major televised memorial event.
"Looking me in the eyes, they say that if I don't agree to a secret funeral, they will do something with my son's body," she said in a video posted to Navalny's widow's social media account.
"According to the law, they should have given me Alexei's body immediately," she said. "Instead, they are blackmailing me, and telling me where, when and how Alexei should be buried." She has reportedly filed a lawsuit for immediate release to her custody of his body.
Navalny's legal team has seen a death report saying his death was "natural" - however, few other specifics has been made public.
Meanwhile, Western press has already hailed that his wife Yulia is carrying on the work of team Navalny and will lead the political "opposition" against Putin. Name recognition inside Russia is a whole different question...
Yulia Navalnaya once avoided the limelight. Now she's Russia’s newest opposition leader https://t.co/7DPfaMpb3x
— The Associated Press (@AP) February 22, 2024
The Associated Press and others are declaring her Russia's "newest opposition leader" - in what appears a kind of Juan Guaidó moment to manufacture 'mass support' and 'popularity', though Alexei Navalny himself never polled more than two percent among the Russian population.
Thus all of the below from Associated Press is a bit wishful and overdramatic, to say the least:
Navalnaya’s new job will be leading the Russian opposition through one of the darkest and most turbulent times in its history.
The opposition is fractured, and Navalny’s death dealt it a serious blow. The question now is whether Navalnaya can rally her husband’s troops and work with other opposition groups to mount any kind of successful challenge to Putin, who is on a path to serve another six years in the Kremlin after the presidential election in March.
She's already addressed the Munich Security Conference, where defense leaders and diplomats were present from around the globe, and is expected to continue to rise in prominence, in the media lens at least. Likely she'll soon be featured at major events from Paris to London to Washington D.C.
(Article by Tyler Durden republished from Zerohedge.com)
