Tag Navalny

Navalny’s return II

They sent provocateurs to the Vnukovo airport where Navalny supporters had gathered to meet and greet him back home. They diverted the plane to another airport, Sheremetyevo. They detained Navalny there – even before he had crossed the line from…

Navalny’s return

Alexei Navalny plans to return to Moscow tonight on a Pobeda flight. The Kremlin – the same bunch who ordered him killed in August 2020 – is likely to arrest him on whatever charges their lackeys are capable of trumping…

Free speech under Yeltsin: Black October

It’s good to know that Russia’s number one opposition leader supports an expansive understanding of free speech. Navalny may be wrong on Trump versus Twitter but it’s far more important – in the Russian context – that he get the…

Navalny on the Trump Twitter ban

Anne Applebaum has quoted Alexey Navalny‘s recent Tweet, in which the Russian opposition leader criticized Donald Trump’s expulsion from Twitter. Here’s a concatenation of some points Navalny made that I feel are not without some merit: Don’t tell me he…

“I called my killer and he confessed”

If you’re following Russian politics, you must know it already: I Called My Killer and He Confessed. You can read the transcript and watch the full video on the Guardian‘s site as well as on Bellingcat‘s, where you can also…

Tracking down the poisoners

CNN has published a summary of its joint investigation with Bellingcat into the poisoning of Alexei Navalny in August 2020. By examining thousands of phone records along with flight manifests and other documents obtained by Bellingcat, this joint months-long investigation…

Murder as self-actualization

Extracts from Alexei Navalny’s interview with Mediazona published on Wednesday: Although we know that the Kremlin is full of monstrous bloodsuckers, that they are so fixated on money and power that they have lost their minds… We didn’t expect them…

Putin puts up Such a Good Defense

A much-respected Russian scholar has compared the latest goings-on in Russian politics to a French folk tale. I believe it can be found in Henri Pourrat’s collection Le Trésor des contes. (I hope I understood the comparison correctly.) Its title…

Navalny poisoned with Novichok

Here’s the latest – well, almost – from Germany: Toxicology test results from a German military hospital produced results showing “unequivocal evidence” that Navalny was poisoned with Novichok, a German government spokesperson said. In a more precise formulation, “unequivocal evidence…

Navalny poisoned

Alexei Navalny, the Russian opposition leader, has been poisoned and is in a coma. He is being treated in a hospital in Omsk, a major city in Western Siberia. Police officers and secret police agents have cut off all access…

Fear and political participation

Russians are still pretty apolitical animals but they are gradually realizing that their passivity is contributing to the country’s stagnation and general hopelessness. When they quit the “quiet desperation” mode, they look to others who have made it farther into…