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A powerful opposition has not existed in Russia for a long time. Kremlin boss Vladimir Putin (70) has largely silenced critical voices. Putin’s harshest critics are either behind bars, exiled – or even murdered.
Blick shows the Kremlin’s most prominent opponents and what fate befell them.
Alexey Navalny
Alexei Navalny (46) is probably Putin’s best-known opponent internationally. He is also regarded as Putin’s greatest enemy of the state in his own country and is one of the most prominent political prisoners in Russia. He was tried again and again, but Putin could never silence him. In August 2020, Navalny survived an attack with the neurotoxin Novichok. As a result, he had to be treated in Germany for several months.
In January 2021, he returned to Russia despite warnings. He was arrested at the airport. A Moscow court subsequently found the imprisoned Kremlin opponent guilty of, among other things, fraud in a controversial trial. He was sentenced to nine years in prison and is in solitary confinement. Apparently this causes him a lot of health problems.
However, Navalny’s team is not deterred by the capture of the Kremlin critic. It always causes a stir. For example, in January 2021, Navalny’s team published exclusive sketches, photos and even a computer model of Putin’s mega-palace on the Black Sea.
Many of Navalny’s confidants have left the country under enormous pressure in recent years. Leonid Volkov, one of Navalny’s closest confidants, was forced to leave the country in 2019 following a money laundering investigation.
Ilya Yashin
Ilya Yashin (39) repeatedly criticized the war in Ukraine and shot at Putin. For example, he spoke on YouTube in June last year about the Butscha massacre and described the scenes as “purely apocalyptic, like in horror movies”. He also criticized Putin.
As a result, Yashin was arrested and sentenced to eight and a half years in prison. The authorities’ justification: he had harmed Russia and “spread false information specifically”. The 39-year-old is also said to have close ties to Alexei Navalny.
He became known for the protest movement against the Kremlin in 2011 and 2012. Today he is considered one of Putin’s most dangerous opponents.
Vladimir Kara-Mursa
Vladimir Kara-Mursa (41) is a historian who fights against the elites in the Kremlin. In 2015 and 2017, he was the victim of mysterious poison attacks. As a result of the poisoning, he even fell into a coma. To this day it has not been possible to unequivocally attribute the attacks, but experts believe that Kremlin ranks were targeted. Kara-Mursa herself said in an interview with Blick in 2018: “The attacks bear the signature of the Russian security services or people associated with them. In both cases, a very powerful and advanced poison was used. Within hours, all my main organs. My chances of survival were five percent.”
In April 2022, after criticizing the invasion of Ukraine, he was arrested and charged with spreading fake news. The protest is still pending. According to his lawyer, Kara-Mursa could face up to 25 years in prison.
Boris Nemtsov
The Russian opposition figure Boris Nemtsov († 55) was long considered one of the strongest voices in the fight against Vladimir Putin – until one evening in February 2015. When Nemtsov crossed a bridge near the Kremlin, he shot him this Sunday at a demonstration by opponents of Putin.
Nemtsov was hit by four shots, the Interior Ministry said. The government opponent allegedly walked across a bridge near the Kremlin with an acquaintance when several perpetrators shot him in the back. They were sentenced to long prison terms in 2017, but it is still unclear who ordered the murder. Here, too, close ties to the Kremlin are said to exist.
Four bullets ended the life of one of the most colorful figures in the Russian opposition. The charismatic politician was one of Putin’s fiercest critics.
Nemtsov served as Deputy Prime Minister under President Boris Yeltsin in 1997 and 1998 and was considered one of the architects of liberal economic reforms.
Source: Blick
I am Amelia James, a passionate journalist with a deep-rooted interest in current affairs. I have more than five years of experience in the media industry, working both as an author and editor for 24 Instant News. My main focus lies in international news, particularly regional conflicts and political issues around the world.
