Putin critic Navalny sentenced to 19 years in prison for extremism

As the judge read out the verdict, Navalny stood alongside his lawyers and his co-defendant with his arms crossed, listening with a serious expression on his face.

A Russian court convicted imprisoned opposition leader Alexei Navalny on charges of extremism and sentenced him to 19 years in prison Friday, his spokesperson and Russian news agencies reported. Navalny is already serving a nine-year term on a variety of charges that he says were politically motivated.

The new charges related to the activities of Navalny’s anti-corruption foundation and statements by his top associates. It was his fifth criminal conviction and the third and longest prison term handed to him, all of which his supporters see as a deliberate Kremlin strategy to silence its most ardent opponent. It wasn’t immediately clear whether he would serve this new term concurrently with his current sentence on charges of fraud and contempt of court.

The prosecution had demanded a 20-year prison sentence, and Navalny said beforehand that he expected to receive a lengthy term.

Navalny was also sentenced in 2021 to two and a half years in prison for a parole violation. The extremism trial took place behind closed doors in the penal colony east of Moscow where he is imprisoned.

Navalny appeared in the courtroom wearing prison garb and looking gaunt, but with a defiant smile on his face. As the judge read out the verdict, the politician stood alongside his lawyers and his co-defendant with his arms crossed, listening with a serious expression on his face.

It took the judge less than 10 minutes to announce the verdict and the sentence _ something that in Russia usually takes hours and even days. The hearing was broadcast to reporters in a separate room, but the judge’s speech was barely audible. Navalny’s spokesperson, Kira Yarmysh, confirmed the verdict on social media, and Russian state news agencies RIA Novosti and Tass ran direct quotes from the verdict.

The 47-year-old Navalny is President Vladimir Putin’s fiercest foe and has exposed official corruption and organized 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.

Navalny’s allies said the extremism charges retroactively criminalized all of the anti-corruption foundation’s activities since its creation in 2011. In 2021, Russian authorities outlawed the foundation and the vast network of Navalny’s offices in Russian regions as extremist organizations, exposing anyone involved to possible prosecution.