Current:Home > MarketsNavalny’s family and supporters are laying the opposition leader to rest after his death in prison-Angel Dreamer Wealth Society D1 Reviews & Insights
Navalny’s family and supporters are laying the opposition leader to rest after his death in prison
View Date:2024-12-23 23:35:40
Hundreds of people gathered to bid farewell to Alexei Navalny at a funeral Friday in Moscow under a heavy police presence, following a battle with authorities over the release of his body after his still-unexplained death in an Arctic penal colony.
His supporters said several churches in Moscow refused to hold the service before Navalny’s team got permission from one in the capital’s Maryino district, where he once lived before his 2020 poisoning, treatment in Germany and subsequent arrest on his return to Russia.
The Church of the Icon of the Mother of God Soothe My Sorrows, which was encircled by crowd-control barriers, did not mention the service on its social media page. Hours before the funeral was set to start, hundreds waited to enter the church under the watch of police who deployed in big numbers. Western diplomats were spotted in the long line.
After the hearse arrived at the church, the coffin could be seen on livestreamed footage being taken out of the vehicle, as the crowd applauded and chanted: “Navalny! Navalny!”
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov urged those gathering in Moscow and other places not to break the law, saying any “unauthorized (mass) gatherings” are violations.
A burial was to follow at the nearby Borisovskoye Cemetery, where police also showed up in force.
Navalny’s mother, Lyudmila Navalnaya, spent eight days trying to get authorities to release the body following his Feb. 16 death at Penal Colony No. 3 in the town of Kharp, in the Yamalo-Nenets region about 1,900 kilometers (1,200 miles) northeast of Moscow.
Even on Friday itself, the morgue where the body was being held delayed its release, according to Ivan Zhdanov, Navalny’s close ally and director of his Anti-Corruption Foundation.
Authorities originally said they couldn’t turn over the body because they needed to conduct post-mortem tests. Navalnaya, 69, made a video appeal to President Vladimir Putin to release it so she could bury her son with dignity.
Once it was released, at least one funeral director said he had been “forbidden” to work with Navalny’s supporters, his spokeswoman Kira Yarmysh said on social media. They also struggled to find a hearse.
“Unknown people are calling up people and threatening them not to take Alexei’s body anywhere,” Yarmysh said Thursday.
Russian authorities still haven’t announced the cause of death for Navalny, 47, who crusaded against official corruption and organized big protests as Putin’s fiercest political foe. Many Western leaders blamed the death on the Russian leader, an accusation the Kremlin angrily rejected.
It was not immediately clear who among Navalny’s family or allies would attend the funeral, with many of his associates in exile abroad due to fear of prosecution in Russia. Navalny’s Foundation for Fighting Corruption and his regional offices were designated as “extremist organizations” by the Russian government in 2021.
The funeral is streamed live on Navalny’s YouTube channel.
His widow, Yulia Navalnaya, accused Putin and Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin of trying to block a public funeral.
“We don’t want any special treatment — just to give people the opportunity to say farewell to Alexei in a normal way,” Yulia Navalnaya wrote on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. In a speech to European lawmakers on Wednesday in Strasbourg, France, she also expressed fears that police might interfere with the gathering or would “arrest those who have come to say goodbye to my husband.”
Moscow authorities refused permission for a separate memorial event for Navalny and slain opposition leader Boris Nemtsov on Friday, citing COVID-19 restrictions, according to politician Yekaterina Duntsova said. Nemtsov, a 55-year-old former deputy prime minister, was shot to death as he walked on a bridge adjacent to the Kremlin on the night of Feb. 27, 2015.
Yarmysh also urged Navalny’s supporters around the world to lay flowers in his honor Friday.
“Everyone who knew Alexei says what a cheerful, courageous and honest person he was,” Yarmysh said Thursday. “But the greater truth is that even if you never met Alexei, you knew what he was like, too. You shared his investigations, you went to rallies with him, you read his posts from prison. His example showed many people what to do when even when things were scary and difficult.”
Zhdanov, the Navalny ally, said that the funeral had initially been planned for Thursday — the day of Putin’s annual state-of-the-nation address — but no venue agreed to hold it then.
In an interview with the independent Russian news site Meduza, Zhdanov said authorities had pressured Navalny’s relatives to “have a quiet family funeral.”
veryGood! (6)
Related
- Taylor Swift drops Christmas merchandise collection, including for 'Tortured Poets' era
- Vanderpump Rules' Tom Sandoval Defends His T-Shirt Sex Comment Aimed at Ex Ariana Madix
- How the Paycheck Protection Program went from good intentions to a huge free-for-all
- Has Conservative Utah Turned a Corner on Climate Change?
- BITFII Introduce
- Warming Trends: Chief Heat Officers, Disappearing Cave Art and a Game of Climate Survival
- Q&A: The Sierra Club Embraces Environmental Justice, Forcing a Difficult Internal Reckoning
- Fisher-Price reminds customers of sleeper recall after more reported infant deaths
- Summer I Turned Pretty's Gavin Casalegno Marries Girlfriend Cheyanne Casalegno
- Bidding a fond farewell to Eastbay, the sneakerhead's catalogue
Ranking
- Inflation ticked up in October, CPI report shows. What happens next with interest rates?
- Electric Vehicles for Uber and Lyft? Los Angeles Might Require It, Mayor Says.
- Avoid these scams on Amazon Prime Day this week
- Allen Weisselberg sentenced to 5 months for his role in Trump Organization tax fraud
- Nelly will not face charges after St. Louis casino arrest for drug possession
- Tatcha's Rare Sitewide Sale Is Here: Shop Amazing Deals on The Dewy Skin Cream, Silk Serum & More
- Buying an electric car? You can get a $7,500 tax credit, but it won't be easy
- Celebrity Hairstylist Dimitris Giannetos Shares the $10 Must-Have To Hide Grown-Out Roots and Grey Hair
Recommendation
-
Japan to resume V-22 flights after inquiry finds pilot error caused accident
-
Has Conservative Utah Turned a Corner on Climate Change?
-
New Arctic Council Reports Underline the Growing Concerns About the Health and Climate Impacts of Polar Air Pollution
-
Protests Target a ‘Carbon Bomb’ Linking Two Major Pipelines Outside Boston
-
NBC's hospital sitcom 'St. Denis Medical' might heal you with laughter: Review
-
Mental health respite facilities are filling care gaps in over a dozen states
-
BP Pledges to Cut Oil and Gas Production 40 Percent by 2030, but Some Questions Remain
-
Indiana Bill Would Make it Harder to Close Coal Plants
Like
- Steelers' Mike Tomlin shuts down Jayden Daniels Lamar comparison: 'That's Mr. Jackson'
- Air Pollution From Raising Livestock Accounts for Most of the 16,000 US Deaths Each Year Tied to Food Production, Study Finds
- Air Pollution From Raising Livestock Accounts for Most of the 16,000 US Deaths Each Year Tied to Food Production, Study Finds