(Moscow) The mother of Russian opponent Alexeï Navalny affirmed Thursday that she had been able to see the body of her son, after several days of waiting, but accused the Russian authorities of exercising “blackmail” against her for bury it secretly.
In the 2010s, before the repressive machine completely fell on him, Mr. Navalny managed to mobilize crowds, particularly in Moscow, thus gaining his status as Vladimir Putin’s number 1 opponent.
And despite the repression that has decimated the opposition, a public funeral could theoretically mobilize its supporters.
“They want everything to be done secretly, without ceremony, they want to take me to the confines of a cemetery, near a fresh grave, and tell me “here lies your son”. I do not agree with that,” declared Lyoudmila Navalnaïa, in a video released Thursday by the opponent’s team.
Mme Navalnaya said she was taken to the morgue and was able to see the remains. She also says she is in Salekhard, the capital of the Yamalo-Nenetsia district, a region in the Far North where Alexeï Navalny died in detention on February 16.
According to his mother, investigators have already established the cause of death, “and all the legal and medical documents are ready.”
According to the opponent’s team, the cause of death is listed as “natural”.
“Legally, they should have returned Alexei’s body to me immediately, but they didn’t. Instead, they are blackmailing me,” the mother criticized the opponent.
“I am recording this video because they started threatening me. Looking me in the eye, they say that if I refuse a secret funeral, they will do something with his body. The inspector […] told me openly “Time is against you, the corpse decomposes”,” she said.
According to her, the pressure could come from the Kremlin or the Russian Investigative Committee, a powerful investigative body.
“I want for you, those for whom Alexei was a loved one, for whom his death was a personal tragedy, there is an opportunity to say goodbye to him,” continued the opponent’s mother.
No political event
For Russian political scientist Tatiana Stanovaïa, the authorities want at all costs to prevent a funeral from becoming a catalyst for Russians who are opposed to the Kremlin and who cannot express it publicly under penalty of arrest or prosecution.
“A decision was made to convince Navalny’s mother to make a deal. They will return the body, but on condition that the funeral does not become a political event,” she wrote on her Telegram account.
Russian police, following the death of the opponent, arrested hundreds of people who came to pay tribute to him by placing flowers on monuments in memory of the victims of Soviet repression.
Since Saturday, Lyoudmila Navalnaïa had sought access to his body, with investigators ensuring that “expertise” was necessary. She even turned to President Vladimir Putin to win her case.
The team of the Kremlin’s main adversary, who died after three years of imprisonment in increasingly trying conditions, accuses the Kremlin of having Alexeï Navalny killed and of seeking to cover up his traces.
Europeans and Americans believed that Putin and his regime were responsible for his death, accusations described by the Kremlin as “gross and unfounded”. The Russian president himself did not comment on the death of his opponent.
The West “acts as if it were prosecutor, judge and executioner at the same time. Hysteria over Navalny’s death proves it […] these people have no right to interfere in our internal affairs,” said Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov from Brazil on Thursday, on the sidelines of a G20 meeting.