Squiz Shortcuts - Alexei Navalny

Your Shortcut to Alexei Navalny

The big international story this past week has been the news that Alexei Navalny, the leader of Russia’s opposition movement, has died in a remote Arctic prison – or, according to his family and supporters, was murdered by Vladimir Putin. Navalny’s death has caused international outcry and condemnation of the Russian state, even as they’re heading towards an election basically guaranteed to keep Putin in power for another six years… so we’ll get you across who’s who and what’s what, including:

• all about who Navalny was,

• why this one man was so significant in Russian politics, and

• what his death might mean for the world

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What was the news last week?
We heard from Russian state media that Alexei Navalny had collapsed and died at the prison he was being held in. Russian state media isn’t the most reliable news source, so at first it was unclear if Navalny was actually dead – but his death was later confirmed by his family.

So, who was Navalny?
Let’s go all the way back to the start, when Navalny was a lawyer who was becoming active in politics in the early 2000s. Then, in 2008, in his early 30s, he started a blog exposing corruption and corporate wrongdoing within Russia, which won him admirers. In 2011, he used his internet platform to help spark street protests against fraud in Russia’s elections…

From blogger to activist…
He really did make the most of the internet… It was around this time that he began calling Vladimir Putin’s ruling political party a “party of crooks and thieves”. By now, though, the Russian state has taken notice and began trying to shut Navalny down.

Uh oh…
In 2013, Navalny was convicted in an embezzlement case that was widely seen as a political stitch-up… but then something pretty remarkable happened. His supporters launched a snap protest, and Navalny was released from prison the next day. Within a couple of months, he ran to become the mayor of Moscow.

Life comes at you fast… did he win?
He did not, but he got 27% of the vote and came second. His popularity grew over the next few years, and as the head of a new political party, Navalny started preparing to run for Russia’s presidency.

… guessing he didn’t win that either?
In fact, he didn’t even get to be on the ballot. A Russian court ruled that his criminal convictions meant he couldn’t take part in the 2018 election. Navalny again blamed Russia’s political system for trying to keep him down.

What happens next?
This is where the story takes a dark turn because in August 2020 Navalny fell ill on a flight. The pilot managed to land and get emergency medical aid, but Navalny very nearly died. His family got him transferred to Germany for medical treatment.

But wait, why did Navalny fall sick on the flight?
That’s the question… everybody suspected poisoning by the Russian state, and European leaders demanded answers. Putin denied it all and called the allegations “unsubstantiated”. But then, Navalny woke up from his medical coma, and began doing his own digging…

Okay…
Working with investigative journalists, Navalny figured out that a group of Russian state agents had been following him around, and he even managed to track down their names and phone numbers. Then, just a few months after the attempted poisoning, Navalny released a short movie on YouTube titled, “I Called My Killer. He Confessed”. Navalny had managed to phone one of the secret agents and get him to unwittingly talk about the poisoning attempt.

That’s pretty extraordinary…
Sure is. At that point, Navalny was still in Germany recovering from the poison attack – but he didn’t want to live in exile, so he decided to return to Russia, even though he knew he’d be arrested and thrown into prison. Which is exactly what happened in January 2021.

So Navalny was in prison… what happened next?
We know that the last 3 years of Alexei Navalny’s life were spent in Russian jails, facing charges that he and his team say were yet more political attempts to silence him. But he continued to make political speeches whenever he appeared in court, and write love letters from prison to his wife, Yulia. That is, until the news of his death last week, at age 47…

What’s been the reaction to Navalny’s death?
So far, worldwide condemnation and outrage. US President Joe Biden directly blamed Vladimir Putin and called the death of Navalny “yet more proof of Putin’s brutality”. Our own Prime Minister Anthony Albanese called Navalny “a courageous force for democracy in Russia”, and said “his treatment was unforgivable”.

What about Russia’s upcoming election?
Given Russia’s political system, the presidential election in mid-March is basically just a formality to re-elect Vladimir Putin for another 6 years. But the election still matters because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine… some political commentators have argued that if Putin gets an overwhelming vote (which is likely) then that could be used to justify continuing the invasion of Ukraine.

What about Navalny’s allies, what have they said?
In just the last few days, Alexei Navalny’s wife, Yulia Navalnaya, released a video statement in which she promised to “continue to fight for our country”. She said, “We need to use every opportunity to fight against the war, against corruption, against injustice … To fight to take our country back … the beautiful Russia of the future, of which my husband dreamed so much."

Onto our recommendations

Reading: anything by Masha Gessen, another Russian dissident who wrote about Navalny’s death in The New Yorker.

Watching: the Oscar-winning documentary Navalny, about the 2020 poisoning attempt and Navalny’s efforts to track down his would-be assassins. You can currently watch it for free on SBS On Demand.

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