The body of Russia’s most prominent opposition leader Alexei Navalny has been handed to his mother, more than a week after he died in an Arctic prison colony, his spokesperson said on Saturday.
President Vladimir Putin’s most vocal critic, 47-year-old Navalny died on February 16 in one of Russia’s toughest prisons in northern Siberia, where he was serving a 19-year sentence.
“Alexei’s body was handed over to his mother. Many thanks to all those who demanded this with us,” Navalny spokesperson Kira Yarmysh said in an X post.
Russian authorities had refused to give custody of Navalny’s body to his family for the past week.
According to an AFP report, Navalny’s team on Friday said they had filed a lawsuit to obtain the body, alleging that local investigators had threatened to bury him on the prison grounds if his mother did not agree to a “secret” funeral.
His team had also noted previously that the Kremlin was trying to stop a public funeral, which could turn into a show of support for Navalny.
Earlier, Alexei Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya claimed that Putin had personally ordered that his body should not be handed over to his family after his death in an Arctic jail nine days ago.
“You tortured him alive, now you torture him while he is dead,” Yulia Navalnaya said in a new video.
“I completely understand that this has not been curated by some investigator in Salekhard. Putin is directing it all. It’s Putin saying ‘put pressure on the mother, break her, tell her the body of her son is rotting’,” she said.
Putin, on the other hand, who famously never said Navalny’s name in public, is yet to comment on his death.
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