World News | Russia Seeks a 20-year Prison Term for Kremlin Foe Navalny in Closed Trial, Ally Says

Tallinn, Jul 20 (AP) Russian prosecutors asked a court to sentence imprisoned opposition leader Alexei Navalny to 20 years in prison on extremism charges, his ally Ivan Zhdanov said on Thursday.

According to Zhdanov, the trial against Navalny, which went on behind closed doors in the prison where the politician is serving another lengthy sentence, is scheduled to conclude with a verdict on August 4.

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Navalny, 47, is President Vladimir Putin's fiercest foe who exposed official corruption and organised major anti-Kremlin protests.

He was arrested in January 2021 upon returning to Moscow after recuperating in Germany from nerve agent poisoning that he blamed on the Kremlin.

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The authorities sentenced him to 2 1/2 years in prison for parole violations and then to another nine years on charges of fraud and contempt of court.

The politician is currently serving his sentence in a maximum-security prison east of Moscow.

The new charges relate to the activities of Navalny's anti-corruption foundation and statements by his top associates. His allies said the charges retroactively criminalise all the foundation's activities since its creation in 2011.

Navalny has rejected all the charges against him as politically motivated and accused the Kremlin of seeking to keep him behind bars for life. (AP)

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)