Concerns raised over Navalny's whereabouts: "he's not on the list"
2:31 PM EST, December 11, 2023
The current situation surrounding anti-Kremlin opposition leader, Alexei Navalny, remains unclear. Navalny, detained in a penal colony, has been absent from recent video hearings. Over the last six days, attempts by Navalny's associates to communicate with him have proven futile. The 47-year-old has remained in jail since 2021.
A staunch critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, Alexei Navalny, has spent over 11 years behind bars due to alleged fraudulent activities - charges that even the "injured" party dismisses.
The civil-political movement of the 47-year-old opposition leader has been proscribed and branded as "extremist". This past August, a Moscow court declared Navalny guilty of establishing and financing an extremist organization and related activities. Authorities have also charged him with "incitement to extremism".
Additional criminal cases have been initiated by the Russian authorities against Navalny, leading to cumulative sentences exceeding 30 years in prison. Presently, Navalny's supporters are sounding the alarm given their inability to contact him.
It appears that Alexei Navalny has disappeared from the record. He's not listed among the inmates where he was serving his sentence. Navalny's lawyer has been told that his client is "no longer on the list" at the prison in Vladimir region, where he had been serving his sentence - as reported in the "Nexta" profile on platform X (formerly Twitter).
The precise location and condition of Navalny are currently unknown. He was previously not connected to the court hearing via video link, and his allies have been unable to get in touch with him for six days.
Nearly three years behind bars
Navalny was arrested in January 2021 post his return to Russia from Germany, where he was recuperating from a poisoning attempt. The opposition leader alleges that Russian secret forces were behind this assassination attempt. The absence of any official investigation into this attempt on the life of a Russian citizen indicates that Navalny's suspicion could be valid.
