Police took several allies of the jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny into custody early on Thursday, ahead of planned demonstrations at the weekend.
Aides of the opposition figure were subjected to searches linked to a criminal investigation launched by Russia's Interior Ministry.
The probe was into alleged violations of coronavirus restrictions during protests last week, they added.
'Go out and do not be afraid'
The opposition has called for fresh demonstrations on Sunday to demand Navalny's release. The 44-year-old was arrested after returning to Russia from Germany, where he received medical treatment and was recovering following a poisoning attack.
"Go out and do not be afraid," Navalny wrote in a message posted on his team's website.
"Nobody wants to live in a country where arbitrariness and corruption rule," he said. "We have the majority on our side."
Those arrested include activist Maria Alyokhina from the punk band Pussy Riot, and Navalny's ophthalmologist Anastasia Vasilyeva, who is also head of the independent Doctors’ Alliance labor union.
Vasilyeva appeared on social media playing the piano as police raided her apartment.
Navalny's team said his brother Oleg as well as his ally Lyubov Sobol were also detained.
Navalny granted meeting with lawyer
Meanwhile, a Moscow court on Thursday rejected an appeal from Navalny's legal team against his 30-day pretrial detention. The opposition politician told a judge that he had not been allowed a one-to-one meeting with his defense lawyer since being arrested upon his return to Russia.
The judge gave Navalny five minutes to speak to his lawyer via video link, with prison guards asked to leave the room so that they could talk privately.
'Blatant lawlessness'
Navalny also attended the court hearing from prison through a video link. During the hearing, Navalny criticized what he described as the "lawlessness" of the process.
"This is blatant lawlessness to intimidate me and other people," he told the court.
"You won't succeed in frightening us. We are the majority... I'm happy that more and more people understand that the law is on our side. That we're in the right," he said.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
Face of Russia's opposition
The lawyer-turned-political campaigner has been among the most prominent figures of Russia's opposition to President Vladimir Putin. Navalny came to prominence in 2008, when his blog exposing malpractice in Russian politics and among the country's major state-owned companies came to public attention. Revelations published on his blog even led to resignations, a rarity in Russian politics.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
Disputed parliamentary elections
In 2011 Navalny was arrested for the first time. He ended up spending 15 days in prison for his role at a rally outside the State Duma in Moscow. A recent parliamentary election victory for Putin's United Russia had been marred by instances of ballot stuffing, reported by demonstrators on social media. Upon his release, Navalny pledged to continue the protest movement.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
Second jail term
After being reelected president in 2012, Putin ordered Russia's Investigative Committee to launch a criminal inquiry into Navalny's past. The following year the campaigner was charged and sentenced again, this time for five years, for alleged embezzlement in the city of Kirov. However, he was released the following day pending affirmation from a higher court. The sentence was later suspended.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
Anti-Kremlin platform grows
Despite being embroiled in legal troubles, Navalny was allowed to run in the 2013 Moscow mayoral election. A second-place finish behind Putin ally Sergei Sobyanin was seen as an overwhelming success and galvanized the Russian opposition movement.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
Navalny takes to social media
His anti-Kremlin rhetoric led Navalny to be banned from appearing on Russian state-owned television. That forced him to deliver his political message over social media and his blog. His talent for public speaking, punchy use of language and humorous mockery of Putin and his loyalists mobilized a legion of young followers.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
Presidential ambitions
In December 2016, the opposition leader announced the formal start of his campaign to run for the Russian presidency in March 2018. However, repeated accusations of corruption, which his supporters say are politically motivated, ultimately barred him from running for public office.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
Convicted of corruption
In 2016 the European Court of Human Rights ruled that Russia had violated Navalny's right to a fair trial in the Kirov case. Although Russia's Supreme Court overturned the five-year sentence, the verdict was sent back to the Kirov court. In 2017, this court again handed Navalny a suspended five-year sentence.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
Moscow's biggest protests in 6 years
In February 2017, anti-corruption rallies across dozens of Russian cities led to the arrests of over 1,000 demonstrators, including Navalny. The protests, believed to have been the largest in the Russian capital since 2012, were spurred by a report published by Navalny linking Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev to a property empire valued at billions of euros. Navalny was released 15 days later.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
Physically assaulted
Navalny was assaulted and hospitalized in April 2017 after being hit in the eye with a chemical green dye. The attack permanently damaged his right cornea. Navalny accused Russian authorities of stopping him from seeking medical treatment abroad due to the embezzlement conviction against him. He was eventually permitted by the Kremlin human rights council to travel to Spain for eye surgery.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
Repeated arrests
In 2018, Navalny was jailed for 30 days. After his release in September, he faced another 20-day stint. In April 2019, the European Court of Human Rights ruled Russia had violated Navalny's rights by holding him under house arrest for most of 2014 during the Kirov embezzlement case.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
Alleged poisoning
In July 2019, only weeks after being released from a 10-day jail sentence, Navalny was again jailed for 30 days for violating Russia's strict protest laws. The opposition leader accused Russia of poisoning him with an allergic agent while in jail.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
Raids and frozen assets
Using YouTube and social media, Navalny had amassed a following of millions by late December 2019. Then police raided his Anti-Corruption Foundation headquarters (above), detaining him in the process. His staff said officials wanted to confiscate their tech equipment. Just a few months later, in March, Navalny reported that his bank accounts and those of his family members had been frozen.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
A plane — and a coma
On August 20, Navalny's spokesperson announced the activist became violently ill during a flight from Siberia to Moscow. The plane made an emergency landing, and Navalny was rushed to a hospital in Russia's Omsk and later evacuated to Berlin's Charite clinic (above). Doctors said he was in a coma. Navalny's associates claimed he had been poisoned and pointed to previous attacks on the activist.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
Back from the brink
Navalny was taken out of the coma less than three weeks later and was said to be responsive. Not long afterwards, he was posting on Instagram, saying he was slowly regaining strength following weeks of only being "technically alive." The German government said labs in France and Sweden both confirmed that Navalny had been poisoned with the Soviet-era nerve agent Novichok.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
A smoking gun?
Months later, Navalny released the recording of a phone call he made to a man he said was a member of Russia's Federal Security Service, whose headquarters is pictured above. The alleged agent said he was not directly involved in poisoning Navalny, but deeply involved with efforts to clean up any traces of Novichok. Moscow dismissed the recording as fake.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
Return, arrest, and trial
Navalny had promised to return to Russia and he did so, despite warnings that he would be arrested. He was taken into police custody shortly after arriving in Moscow. The dissident, seen here at a passport control point, had said he was "not afraid of anything." He was sentenced to 30 days in prison at a swiftly convened trial the following day.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
Conviction and sentencing
Navalny was ordered to spend two years and eight months in a penal colony for violating terms of his probation while recovering in Germany from his poisoning. He dismissed the proceedings an attempt by the Kremlin to scare Russians into submission.
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Who is Alexei Navalny?
Ruling sparks unrest in Russia
Navalny supporters took to the streets soon after the prison sentence was announced. Navalny's aides called for a rally in Moscow's Manezhnaya Square, which was blocked off by riot police.
Author: David Martin
"We'll never allow ... these people to seize and steal our country. Yes, brute force is on your side now. You can...put me in handcuffs. [But] that will not continue forever."
A makeshift court at a police station last week ordered Navalny placed in custody until February 15. He was then moved to Moscow's Matrosskaya Tishina, a high-security detention center.
Whether a previous suspended sentence will be converted into a prison term, as prosecutors are calling for, will be decided in another hearing on Tuesday.
Raids on houses and offices
Police on Wednesday raided apartments and offices belonging to Navalny and his associates.
It is reported that Navalny's wife, Yulia, was in one of the apartments and his brother in another. Police also raided two offices belonging to Navalny's FBK anti-corruption organization.
It was FBK that published a video last week of a luxury Black Sea property that Navalny claimed was owned by Russian President Vladimir Putin and paid for through an elaborate corruption scheme.
Several social media users posted images and video of police breaking down doors at the apartments as well as the offices. One user posted video of "special units breaking down the door to the 'Navalny Live' studio."
Navalny is accused by Russian prosecutors of breaking the terms of the sentence by traveling to Germany. He had been in a coma from the Novichok attack when he was taken to Berlin.
rc/sms (Reuters, AP, AFP, dpa)
