Last week, for the first time since the Soviet era, the Kremlin officially classified opposition to its rule as a criminal offense. In a decision harking back to the infamous Article 70 of Soviet Russia’s criminal code that penalized “anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda” – and that landed prominent dissidents, from Vladimir Bukovsky to Yuri Orlov, in prisons and labor camps – Moscow prosecutors suspended the activities of the nationwide organization of Alexei Navalny, Vladimir Putin’s most prominent opponent. Navalny is currently incarcerated in a prison camp after surviving a state-sponsored assassination attempt last year.
Alexei Navalny
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Activists from Amnesty International demonstrate outside the Russian embassy in Berlin, on April 24, 2021, calling for the release of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny.
