what to remember from the posthumous interview with Russian opponent Alexeï Navalny

It’s a thirty-seven minute video that had never beennever been broadcast. In the images, Alexeï Navalny answers questions from Jacques Maire, then deputy for La République en Marche. It is December 2020, in a hotel in Berlin, and the Russian opponent is still alive. Alive and free to move. Faced with the French parliamentarian, he talks about the attempted poisoning of which he has just been a victim, about Vladimir Putin and his death, which he already knows is inevitable. Franceinfo summarizes what you need to remember from this posthumous interview, published Thursday March 7 by Release and LCI.

On the conditions of the interview

The meeting took place in an ultra-secure hotel in Berlin, on December 17, 2020. At the time, it was in the German capital that the Russian opponent was treated after the poisoning attempt which almost cost him his life . Jacques Maire, member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, traveled to question him as part of an investigation carried out by the Council of Europe.

The chosen one wishes “legally qualify the facts” and establish the responsibility of the Russian authorities. At the time of the hearing, Moscow was still a member of the Council of Europe, Europe’s leading human rights organization. In this filmed deposition, the opponent of Vladimir Putin answers questions in English. One month to the day later, the Russian opponent will board the plane, heading to Russia and prison.

This hearing of almost forty minutes “was not intended to be” made public. HASWith the agreement of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, Jacques Maire is releasing this new video to the public debate. Because it is about “documents of public interest for history”reacts the former deputy in the columns of Release. It is “also a way of paying tribute [à Navalny]. Because everyone who sees this video sees this man who comes out of the hospital, who has just been poisoned and who says to himself: ‘I’m going back into battle tomorrow’.”

On secret service surveillance

In this interview, Alexeï Navalny places the start of his problems with the Kremlin after his success in the Moscow municipal elections in 2013, when he declared his intention to run for the presidency. This is where, he said, the secret services “started watching me.” “And then, all of a sudden, they started following me on every trip.”

“It’s a routine, every time I go somewhere I’m watched.”

Alexeï Navalny, Russian opponent

And the Russian opponent continues: “It’s regular surveillance carried out by the police or the FSB, with local personnel, all the time when I’m traveling. And in Moscow too. All the time. But it’s very easy to spot them: they They’re just following you, these men pretending to talk on the phone.”

On his poisoning

Despite the seriousness of the circumstances, the atmosphere seems relaxed between Jacques Maire and Alexeï Navalny. Coffee in hand, the Russian opponent recounts the attempted poisoning of which he was the victim a few months earlier, on August 20, 2020. With a touch of humor, he describes a carefully prepared operation, “Totally worthy of Hollywood”. “I have not the slightest doubt that these people have been following me for four years”he continues. This is not a simple operation to carry out, it requires a lot of preparation. Even if you’re from the FSB, you can’t just go to the hotel and say, ‘Open this door for me.’ There are cameras. You don’t know if it’s going to leak.”

“As for those who poisoned me, it’s a very secret section. Even within the FSB, no one knows them.”

Alexeï Navalny, Russian opponent

In front of the French parliamentarian, he goes so far as to put forward his own hypotheses. “The product may have been in the Negroni I drank, on a pillow, a towel, the soap, or on the water bottles in the hotel room”, he lists. Before adding cynically: “Beauty of Novichok”, it’s that “no one can know when and how you were poisoned”.

On his end which he knew was inevitable

At the time of the hearing, Alexeï Navalny already had in mind his intention to return to his country. Jacques Maire asks him the question: does he think he will be arrested on his return? Alexei Navalny hesitates. “That’s a question I don’t prefer to answer., he explains. They constantly make threats, they have seized my apartment and my bank accounts. (…) Will I be arrested at the airport? Or later ? I’ve no idea.”

However, he is certain, his imprisonment in Russia would not slow down the opposition movement he launched. To the French elected official, he even confides that he is no longer essential to this cause “who knows how to work”. In the image, here he is standing up: “If they killed me, it wouldn’t change anything, because there are other people who are ready to replace me.”

“My teams know how to operate without me, I spend a lot of time each year in prison, they are used to it. Of course, it would be more difficult. (…) But there are other people who can lead.”

Alexeï Navalny, Russian opponent

A month after uttering this sentence, on January 17, 2021, Alexeï Navalny flew to Russia. When he landed in Moscow, he was arrested by the police when going through passport control. These were his last seconds of freedom. He died on February 16, 2024 in an Arctic penal colony, where he was serving a 19-year prison sentence for “extremism”.