The last farewell to Russian opponent Alexei Navalny: the funeral brings together thousands of followers, under a strong police operation and fear of arrests

More than a thousand people gathered this morning around the church in Moscow where the funeral of the Russian adversary is taking place. Alexei Navalnyin the midst of a strong police operation, and with the presence of several Western ambassadors, including the Italian chargé d’affaires Pietro Sferra Carini.

The coffin containing the remains of the leader who died on February 16 in a remote prison in the Arctic was greeted with applause and chants of “Navalny, Navalny” from the crowd, according to videos published online by his collaborators.

The Kremlin has warned against any “unauthorized” demonstrations. during the funeral celebrated in a church in Marino, south of Moscow, where the opponent lived before being imprisoned.

“Any unauthorized demonstration will constitute a violation of the law. Therefore, those who participate in it will be held responsible in accordance with current law,” presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said. And he added that “the Kremlin has nothing to say to Navalny’s family on the day of his funeral.”

Present at the ceremony were, in addition to the Italian representative Sferra Carini, the United States ambassador to Russia Lynne Tracy, as well as the representatives of Germany, Alexander Lambsdorff, and of France, Pierre Levy.

In a Russia where Television and the official media ignored the eventthe Anti-Corruption Foundation team created by the opponent was in charge of broadcasting the funeral live.

Two members of the team covered coverage from a studio, providing commentary on the crowd gathered outside the Moscow church where the funeral was taking place. Just before the start, 130 thousand people had tuned in.

Dozens of police vehicles and some riot police trucks remained parked near the church. Police officers wearing helmets and carrying tear gas canisters patrolled the area, including at nearby subway stations.

Human rights groups have advised people at Navalny’s funeral to write down details of their lawyers who could help them if they were arrested. And they suggested bringing your passport and water bottles with you too.

The mobilization of numerous Navalny supporters could annoy Putin ahead of the presidential elections on March 15-17. For this reason, Yulia Navalnaya – the widow of the Russian opponent who died on February 16 – expressed fear in front of the European Parliament that the police could carry out arrests. “I don’t know if it will be peaceful or whether the police will arrest those present,” he said before the plenary session of the European Parliament, which paid tribute to the late Russian opponent.

Navalny died in a remote penal colony in the Russian Arctic and, according to his widow, in Russian authorities “they abused his body and they abused his mother”.

As the opponent’s body was handed over to his mother on Saturday, the team of the former main Kremlin critic was looking for a place to offer him a “public farewell”, but according to his aides, multiple requests were “rejected”.

People close to the deceased politician assured that the authorities had exerted pressure on the place where the burial would take place. “Everywhere they refused to give us anything. In some places they told us it was forbidden,” Jdanov explained in a statement published on Telegram, criticizing the “Kremlin and (Sergei) Sobyanin”, the mayor of Moscow, close to Putin . .

The Russian president, who yesterday appeared before the two houses of Parliament on the occasion of his annual speech to the nation and threatened the West for sending troops to Ukraine, did not react to the death of Navalny, who survived a 2020 attack a poisoning of which he accused Putin himself, which the latter has always denied.

The circumstances of Navalny’s death in prison remain unclear. According to Russian prison services, he died after feeling unwell “after a walk”.

However, opposition supporters and numerous Western leaders have blamed Putin for his death, some even alluding to an “assassination” ordered after three years of detention.