For nine days, his mother Lyudmila Navalnaya had been denied custody of his body by the Russian authorities, who claimed they needed to conduct chemical tests.
The team of the deceased Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny announced that his mother had finally received his body from the prison where he died.
Navalny, who was a vocal critic of President Vladimir Putin, passed away on February 16 in a harsh Siberian penal colony, where he was serving a 19-year sentence on politically motivated charges.
For nine days, his mother Lyudmila Navalnaya had been denied custody of his body by the Russian authorities, who claimed they needed to conduct chemical tests. She had traveled to Salekhard, the nearest town to the prison, to demand a dignified burial for her son.
Navalny’s spokeswoman Kira Yarmysh said on X, the former Twitter, that his body was finally handed over to his mother, and thanked everyone who supported their request. She added that the funeral arrangements were still uncertain, as they did not know if the authorities would interfere with the family’s wishes and Navalny’s rights.
Navalny’s team had previously said that they had filed a lawsuit to get the body, and that local investigators had threatened to bury him on the prison grounds if his mother did not consent to a “secret” funeral. They had also said that the Kremlin was trying to prevent a public funeral, which could be a sign of solidarity with Navalny’s cause and opposition to Putin.
Putin, who never uttered Navalny’s name in public, has remained silent on the death of his main rival. Earlier, Navalny’s widow Yulia Navalnaya had accused Putin of holding the body and using various forms of coercion to try to force a “secret” funeral, which she said showed that he did not follow the Christian principles that he often displayed in public events.
She said in a video that Putin was not satisfied with Navalny’s death, and that he continued to “mock” and “blackmail” his mother, threatening to bury him in the prison where he died.
She stressed that Putin was the only one to blame for the situation, as he was the one who gave the orders, “the same one who likes to pretend that he is a devout Christian.” The video showed footage of Putin in several events related to the Orthodox Church.
