(es) Vienna. June 8, 2021
Imprisoned journalist and opposition leader Alexei Navalny has dedicated the Moral Courage awarded by the Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy to political prisoners in Russia and Belarus. His 20-year-old daughter Dasha accepted the prize on his behalf: DW report (ENG).
Navalny joked in May that he had found happiness in prison. But his political future, like his life, is as precarious as President Putin can make it.
The independent and immensely popular Meduza website, based in Latvia, has already been hit by the same potentially ruinous legal manoeuvre. We reported on an interview with the extraordinary founder of Meduza, Galina Timchenko, on May 28.
Tatiana Stanovaya, founder of R.Politik in Paris told CNN the law threatens not only opposition politicians but ordinary Russian citizens. “The law is part of a larger campaign against anti-regime behaviour in Russia…Now even a Russian citizen who participates in protests, retweets an opposition post, or donates to opposition groups, faces the risk of prosecution.”
Last year’s constitutional reform has effectively reset the political clock for Putin, allowing him to seek two more six-year terms when his presidency ends. He has already hinted he is planning to run again.