At least eighty-one people were arrested on Sunday June 4 by the police during actions in support of Alexeï Navalny, whose birthday it was and who for the third time was celebrating him in prison. He claims, however, to keep his spirits up, despite the tightening of his conditions of detention and yet another placement in the mitard.
The specialized NGO OVD-Info counted Sunday evening "more than eighty-one people detained". "Forty-nine of [them] were detained in Moscow," she said. In a first assessment, published on Twitter, the NGO specified that four of those arrested are minors.
Alexeï Navalny says he is placed in a disciplinary cell for the sixteenth time and claims to keep his spirits up. "For her birthday, you have to be honest with yourself and I asked myself this question: am I really in high spirits or am I forcing myself to be like this? My answer is that I really do,” the now 47-year-old activist wrote in a post. His supporters claim that the authorities seek to break him psychologically by regularly sending him for several days in these cells with draconian living conditions.
Soon to be tried in a new case for "extremism"
"Clearly I'd like to not wake up in this hole, but have breakfast with my family, a kiss on the cheek from my kids, open my presents and say 'Wow, this is exactly what I was dreaming of. “,” writes Alexei Navalny. "But life is like this: you can only achieve social progress and a better future if a number of people are willing to pay for the right to hold beliefs," he adds.
According to him, "a day will come when speaking the truth and fighting for justice in Russia will have become an ordinary and harmless thing". “My plan for the past year was not to become irascible and bitter, to keep a relaxed attitude, otherwise it would be the beginning of my defeat,” he explains, thanking his supporters and saluting all “the political prisoners" around the world.
Alexei Navalny should soon be tried in a new case for "extremism" where he faces an additional thirty-five years in prison. Imprisoned since January 2021, on his return to Russia after recovering from serious poisoning which he attributes to the Kremlin, Alexei Navalny believes that this new case is a way to keep him in detention for life.
In March 2021, he was sentenced to nine years in prison on "scam" charges he believes are fictitious. From his prison 200 kilometers from Moscow, he continues to send his team messages recounting his detention and denouncing Vladimir Putin and his invasion of Ukraine.
