Alexei Navalny: Biden blames ‘Putin and his thugs’ for death in prison – latest

Alexei Navalny’s body is not in the morgue where he was supposedly transferred by investigators after his death, the Russian opposition figure’s spokesperson has said.

“Alexei’s lawyer and mother arrived at the Salekhard morgue. It is closed, despite the colony’s assurances that it is working and Navalny’s body is there,” wrote Kira Yarmysh on X.

“The lawyer called the phone number indicated on the door. He was told that he was the seventh person to call today. They don’t have Alexei’s body in the morgue.”

Alexei Navalny’s body has not arrived at the only morgue in Salekhard, the town near to the prison colony where Navalny died, an employee told Reuters by phone on Saturday.

Earlier, the prison authorities said Mr Navalny’s body had been sent to Salekhard for investigations.

Navalny’s spokeswoman Kira Yarmysh on Saturday confirmed that Navalny was dead, citing an official notice given to Navalny’s mother, Lydumila, and demanded that Navalny’s body be handed over to his family immediately.

Alexei Navalny’s spokeswoman Kira Yarmysh on Saturday confirmed that Navalny was dead, citing an official notice given to Navalny’s mother, Lydumila.

Navalny, a 47-year-old former lawyer, fell unconscious and died on Friday after a walk at the “Polar Wolf” Arctic penal colony in Kharp, about 1,900 km (1,200 miles) northeast of Moscow, where he was serving a three-decade sentence, Russian authorities said.

“We demand that Alexei Navalny’s body be given to his family immediately,” Yarmysh said.

UK Foreign secretary Lord David Cameron has warned there will be consequences for the death of Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny.

Speaking to broadcasters at the Munich Security Conference, the Foreign Secretary said: “Reflecting overnight makes you think what an incredibly brave man this was. His life revealed so much about the true nature of (Vladimir) Putin’s ghastly regime. And his death has revealed that all over again.

“There should be consequences. When appalling human rights outrages like this take place, what we do is we look at whether there are individual people that are responsible and whether there are individual measures and actions we can take. We don’t announce them in advance, so I can’t say anything more than that. But that is what we will be looking at.

“Of course we have already summoned the ambassador and made clear our views about this dreadful event and the way this person was treated.”

Lyudmila Navalnaya, the mother of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, is travelling to the prison colony where he died, accompanied by Navalny’s lawyer, Russia’s Novaya Gazeta newspaper has reported.

Mr Navalny, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s most formidable domestic opponent, fell unconscious and died on Friday after a walk at the “Polar Wolf” Arctic penal colony where he was serving a three-decade sentence, authorities said.

Estonian prime minister Kaja Kallas has said that the killing of Alexei Navalny shows “the dictator’s handbook in real life”.

“This is the way Putin operates,” she told the Munich Security Conference. “This is the dictator’s handbook in real life. So we should be aware of this.

“And like president Zelenskiy said, let’s not discuss how to do something, we have to do everything to stop him. Because history rhymes.

“We have seen this already in the 1930s, the same thing, I mean American isolationism on the one side, this not stopping the aggressor when we have the chance to stop him, and then seeing aggression spread all over the world.

“Let’s do the right thing, let’s learn something from history.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has referenced the death of Alexei Navalny during a speech at the Munich Security Conference, branding Vladimir Putin a “thug”.

He told attendees: “Putin kills whoever he wants, be it an opposition leader, or anyone else who seems as the target exactly to him.

“After the murder of Alexei Navalny, it’s absurd to perceive Putin as a supposedly legitimate head of a Russian state and he is a thug who maintains power through corruption and violence.”

Speaking ahead of the two-year anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, he said: “He has just yesterday tried to send us all a clear message as the Munich Security Conference opened, Putin murdered another opposition leader.

“So please, let’s not fear Putin’s defeat and the destruction of his regime. Let’s instead work together to destroy what he stands for. It is his fate to lose, not the fate of the rules based world order to vanish.”

He told attendees: “Do not ask Ukraine when the war will end. Ask yourselves why Putin is still able to continue it.”

Crowds gathered at a vigil for Alexei Navalny outside the Russian embassy in London on Friday 16 February. You can watch the demonstration below.

Britain has joined other Western countries in condemning the Kremlin after Russia’s federal prison service said in a statement that the 47-year-old politician and anti-corruption campaigner had died.

Floral tributes to Alexei Navalny, President Vladimir Putin’s fiercest foe who died on Friday in a Russian penal colony, were removed overnight by groups of unidentified people while police watched, videos on Russian social media show.

More than 100 people were detained in eight cities across Russia after they came to lay flowers in memory of Mr Navalny, according to OVD-Info, a group that monitors political repression in Russia.

On Saturday, police blocked access to a memorial in the Siberian city of Novosibirsk and detained several people there as well as in another Siberian city, Surgut, OVD-Info said.

Video shared on social media from Novosibirsk showed people sticking red flowers upright in the snow under the watchful eye of police who blocked access to the memorial with ticker tape.

In Moscow, flowers were removed overnight from a memorial near the headquarters of Russia’s Federal Security Service by a large group while police looked on, a video showed.

But by morning more flowers had appeared.