Thousands gathered to bid a remaining farewell to Alexey Navalny, many chanting his title and saying they won’t forgive Russian authorities for his loss of life because the opposition chief was laid to relaxation.
Crowds of mourners turned up close to a church in southern Moscow on Friday, ready hours to pay their respects to Navalny beneath the watch of huge numbers of police, after the Kremlin warned in opposition to “unauthorised” protests.
Loud chants of “Navalny, Navalny” rang out because the dissident’s coffin was carried out of a black hearse on arrival on the church within the Maryino district, the passage open regardless of the heavy police presence and antiriot police vans.
After a brief service, pallbearers carried his coffin out for burial on the capital’s Borisovskoye cemetery.
In video streamed from the cemetery, Navalny’s mom Lyudmila and father Anatoly stooped over his open coffin to kiss him for the final time as a small group of musicians performed.
Crossing themselves, mourners stepped ahead to caress his face earlier than a priest gently positioned a white shroud over him. The coffin was then closed and lowered into the bottom.
Navalny, President Vladimir Putin’s fiercest critic inside Russia, died on the age of 47 in an Arctic penal colony on February 16, sparking accusations from his supporters that he had been murdered.
The Kremlin has denied any state involvement in his loss of life.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov earlier warned that “unauthorised gatherings will be in violation of the law and those who participate in them will be held responsible”, in line with Russia’s TASS information company.
Rights organisation OVD-Info stated it knew of “at least 67 arrests in 16 towns” on Friday, together with six arrests in Moscow the place Navalny’s funeral was held.
The rights group says some 400 folks have been detained at memorials for Navalny since his loss of life.
The French and German ambassadors have been within the crowd of mourners on Friday, as have been a few of Russia’s final free impartial politicians.
Among the big crowd, some chanted, “Russia will be free”, “No to war”, “Russia without Putin”, “We won’t forgive” and “Putin is a murderer.” Police have been current in giant numbers however didn’t intervene.
“People like him shouldn’t be dying: honest and principled, willing to sacrifice themselves,” stated one mourner, Anna Stepanova, outdoors the church.
“What are they afraid of? Why so many cars?” she stated. “The people who came here, they are not scared. Alexey wasn’t either.”
Mysterious loss of life
Navalny was recognized for his outspoken and uncompromising criticism of Putin.
His funeral got here after a battle with authorities over the discharge of his physique following his as-yet unexplained loss of life in detention. His physique was held in a morgue for eight days earlier than being returned to the household.
Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya, is outdoors of Russia and didn’t attend the funeral; neither did Navalny’s two kids.
Navalnaya beforehand accused Putin of murdering her husband after which delaying the discharge of his physique in a bid to forestall him from having a dignified public burial.
Kremlin spokesman Peskov has criticised the accusations made by her and a few Western leaders as “vulgar”.
Western governments have been fast to carry the Kremlin accountable, however have stopped in need of making direct accusations of involvement.
Several church buildings in Moscow had refused to carry the service earlier than Navalny’s crew received permission from the Church of the Icon of Our Lady Quench My Sorrows, near the place Navalny lived earlier than his 2020 poisoning, therapy in Germany and subsequent arrest on his return to Russia in 2021.
Addressing the European Parliament this week, Navalnaya advised lawmakers her husband had been tortured for 3 years.
“He was starved in a tiny stone cell, cut off from the outside world and denied visits, phone calls, and then even letters,” she stated.
Navalnaya has pledged to proceed his life’s work and urged to “fight more desperately, more fiercely than before.”
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