Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny yesterday said that his treatment was beyond a “mockery of justice,” as he was brought before a hastily organized court a day after his dramatic airport arrest.
With calls growing in the West for Navalny’s release, he was brought into a courtroom set up at a police station in Khimki on the outskirts of Moscow where he was taken following his detention on Sunday night.
Police seized Navalny, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s most prominent opponent, at a border control post at Sheremetyevo International Airport less than an hour after he returned to Russia from Germany for the first time since he was poisoned with a nerve agent in August.
Photo: AP
In a video posted by his team from inside the hearing, an incredulous Navalny said that he did not understand how a court session could take place at a police station and why no one had been notified until the last minute.
“I’ve seen a lot of mockery of justice, but the old man in the bunker [Putin] is so afraid that they have blatantly torn up and thrown away” Russia’s criminal code, Navalny said.
In another video, Navalny called for the hearing to be open to all journalists, after only pro-Kremlin media were allowed to attend.
“I demand that this procedure be as open as possible, so that all media have the opportunity to observe the amazing absurdity of what is happening here,” he said.
About 100 people, mostly journalists, had gathered in the snow outside the police station and several police vans were waiting nearby with their engines running.
Russia’s FSIN prison service on Sunday said that it had detained Navalny for breaching the terms of a suspended sentence he was given in 2014, on fraud charges he said were politically motivated.
Navalny is also facing potential new criminal charges under a probe launched late last year by Russian investigators, who say he misappropriated more than US$4 million in donations.
His arrest has drawn widespread Western condemnation.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Russian authorities should “immediately release him and ensure his safety.”
The UN human rights office said it was “deeply troubled” by the arrest, while German Minister for Foreign Affairs Heiko Maas said it was “totally incomprehensible.”
Calling the detention “appalling,” UK Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs Dominic Raab wrote on Twitter: “Rather than persecuting Mr Navalny Russia should explain how a chemical weapon came to be used on Russian soil.”
Moscow has hit back at the condemnation, with Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergei Lavrov saying it was an attempt to distract attention from domestic problems in Western countries.
“It looks like Western politicians see this as an opportunity to divert attention from the deepest crisis the liberal development model has found itself in,” Lavrov said.
BUILDUP: US General Dan Caine said Chinese military maneuvers are not routine exercises, but instead are ‘rehearsals for a forced unification’ with Taiwan China poses an increasingly aggressive threat to the US and deterring Beijing is the Pentagon’s top regional priority amid its rapid military buildup and invasion drills near Taiwan, US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said on Tuesday. “Our pacing threat is communist China,” Hegseth told the US House of Representatives Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense during an oversight hearing with US General Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. “Beijing is preparing for war in the Indo-Pacific as part of its broader strategy to dominate that region and then the world,” Hegseth said, adding that if it succeeds, it could derail
CHIP WAR: The new restrictions are expected to cut off China’s access to Taiwan’s technologies, materials and equipment essential to building AI semiconductors Taiwan has blacklisted Huawei Technologies Co (華為) and Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC, 中芯), dealing another major blow to the two companies spearheading China’s efforts to develop cutting-edge artificial intelligence (AI) chip technologies. The Ministry of Economic Affairs’ International Trade Administration has included Huawei, SMIC and several of their subsidiaries in an update of its so-called strategic high-tech commodities entity list, the latest version on its Web site showed on Saturday. It did not publicly announce the change. Other entities on the list include organizations such as the Taliban and al-Qaeda, as well as companies in China, Iran and elsewhere. Local companies need
CRITICISM: It is generally accepted that the Straits Forum is a CCP ‘united front’ platform, and anyone attending should maintain Taiwan’s dignity, the council said The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday said it deeply regrets that former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) echoed the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) “one China” principle and “united front” tactics by telling the Straits Forum that Taiwanese yearn for both sides of the Taiwan Strait to move toward “peace” and “integration.” The 17th annual Straits Forum yesterday opened in Xiamen, China, and while the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) local government heads were absent for the first time in 17 years, Ma attended the forum as “former KMT chairperson” and met with Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference Chairman Wang Huning (王滬寧). Wang
CROSS-STRAIT: The MAC said it barred the Chinese officials from attending an event, because they failed to provide guarantees that Taiwan would be treated with respect The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) on Friday night defended its decision to bar Chinese officials and tourism representatives from attending a tourism event in Taipei next month, citing the unsafe conditions for Taiwanese in China. The Taipei International Summer Travel Expo, organized by the Taiwan Tourism Exchange Association, is to run from July 18 to 21. China’s Taiwan Affairs Office spokeswoman Zhu Fenglian (朱鳳蓮) on Friday said that representatives from China’s travel industry were excluded from the expo. The Democratic Progressive Party government is obstructing cross-strait tourism exchange in a vain attempt to ignore the mainstream support for peaceful development
RSS