© Reuters. A view shows the entrance to the IK-3 penal colony, where Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny served his prison sentence and where he died the previous day, according to prison authorities, in the Kharp settlement in the Yamal region. Nenets, Russia Februa
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KHARP, Russia (Reuters) – Alexei Navalny's mother was told on Saturday that Russia's most prominent opposition leader had been struck by “sudden death syndrome” and that his body would not be released to the family until an investigation will be completed, his team said. saying.
Navalny, a 47-year-old former lawyer, fell unconscious and died on Friday after a walk through the “Polar Wolf” penal colony in Kharp, about 1,900 kilometers northeast of Moscow, where he was serving a three-decade sentence. sentence, the prison service said.
Western leaders, led by US President Joe Biden, paid tribute to Navalny's bravery and, without citing evidence, accused President Vladimir Putin of being responsible for the death. Britain said there would be consequences for Russia.
The Kremlin called the West's reaction unacceptable and “absolutely angry.” Putin has not yet commented on Navalny's death.
Navalny's mother, Lyudmila, 69, braved arctic temperatures of -30 degrees Celsius (-22 degrees Fahrenheit) on Saturday to visit the penal colony where her son died.
He was given an official death notice indicating the time of death at 2:17 pm local time (0917 GMT) on February 16, Navalny's spokeswoman Kira Yarmysh told Reuters.
“When Alexei's lawyer and mother arrived at the colony this morning, they were told that the cause of Navalny's death was sudden death syndrome,” Ivan Zhdanov, director of Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation, said on the platform. social networks
“Sudden death syndrome” is a vague term for different cardiac syndromes that cause sudden cardiac arrest and death.
It was also unclear where Navalny's body was, his team said. Her mother had been told that the body had been taken to Salekhard, the town near the prison complex, but when she arrived at the morgue it was closed.
NAVALNY CORPS
When contacted by Navalny's lawyer, the morgue said it did not have Navalny's body, Yarmysh said.
Officials later told them that the body would not be released until the investigation was completed, although they had previously been told that the investigation had uncovered no traces of criminality.
“At this moment we do not have access to the body and we do not know for sure where it is, and we demand that the Russian authorities immediately hand over Alexei's body to his family,” Yarmysh said in an interview.
An employee at Salekhard's only morgue told Reuters that Navalny's body had not arrived.
The death of Navalny, a former lawyer, deprives Russia's disparate opposition of its most charismatic and courageous leader as Putin prepares for an election that will keep the former KGB spy in power until at least 2030.
Navalny's supporters – even in the West – had portrayed Navalny as a Russian version of South Africa's Nelson Mandela, who would one day walk free to lead the country.
Some Russians, however, dismissed that view as a classic case of wishful thinking, pointing to an opinion poll showing that most Russians disapproved and that Putin was much more popular.
Russian authorities viewed Navalny and his supporters as extremists with ties to the CIA intelligence agency, which they say seeks to destabilize Russia. Navalny always dismissed accusations that he was a CIA asset.
DESPERATION AND APATHY
Some Russians laid flowers in Moscow and other Russian cities in Navalny's honor, although hundreds of flowers and candles in black bags were removed overnight.
In central Moscow, several dozen roses and carnations stood in the softening snow on Saturday at the monument to the victims of Soviet repression, which stands in the shadow of the former KGB headquarters on Lubyanka Square. .
Vladimir Nikitin, 36, was alone putting a carnation on the Solovetsky Stone, which comes from the islands of the same name in the White Sea, where the Bolsheviks founded one of the first “Gulag” forced labor camps in 1923.
“Navalny's death is terrible: hopes have been shattered,” Nikitin said. “Navalny was a very serious man, a brave man and now he is no longer with us. He told the truth, and that was very dangerous because some people did not like the truth.”
At the “Wall of Sorrow” memorial on the avenue named after Soviet physicist and dissident Andrei Sakharov, some Russians laid flowers next to photographs of Navalny. One message read: “We will not forget or forgive.”
The protest monitoring group OVD-Info said more than 270 people had been arrested across Russia at rallies and tributes to Navalny since his death was announced.
Putin's opponents said Navalny's death illustrated how dangerous Putin's Russia had become 32 years after the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991 sparked hopes for a better future.
“Alexei did not die, he was murdered,” Navalny's spokeswoman Yarmysh said. His vision, she said, would live on.
“We lost our leader, but we did not lose our ideas and our beliefs.”
