Jailed Russian opposition leader and anti-corruption activist Alexei Navalny was on Tuesday, 22 March, sentenced to nine years in a maximum-security prison in an alleged case of fraud and contempt of court, which has been branded a 'sham' by Kremlin critics.
On Tuesday, the leader took to Twitter, thanking his supporters and urging them to continue their support of political prisoners through actions. "Any activity against the deceitful and thievish Putin's regime. Any opposition to these war criminals," he wrote.
The judge also ruled that Navalny would have to pay a fine of 1.2 million rubles (about $11,500), news agency AP reported.
Navalny, who is presently serving three and a half years in prison, has already spent a year in jail.
In 2021, he was arrested shortly after his flight from Berlin back to Moscow on 17 January. Authorities claimed that the return was a violation of the terms of a suspended 2014 conviction in a money-laundering case, which Navalny maintains was an illegitimate case.
The lawyer-turned-activist and a strong critic of President Putin. The 44-year-old blogger has millions of Russian followers on social media. He shot to fame when his blogs began exposing the corruption in the Russian government in the late 2000s.
His campaign against Putin had resulted in him getting arrested multiple times. In 2011 Navalny was arrested for the first time for his role at a rally outside the State Duma in Moscow.
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