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Jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny ends hunger strike


Alexei Navalny has said he is ending his hunger strike after getting medical attention and being warned by his doctors that continuing it would be life-threatening.

In an Instagram post on Friday afternoon, the 24th day of his hunger strike, the imprisoned Russian opposition leader said he would continue to demand a visit from his doctor to address a loss of sensation in his legs and arms – his main demand when launching his hunger strike.

But he said he would stop refusing food after getting examined by non-prison doctors. He also acknowledged the mass pro-Navalny protests across Russia on Wednesday.

“Thanks to the huge support of good people across the country and around the world, we have made huge progress,” Navalny said in his message.

Another reason he was ending the hunger strike he began on 31 March was that some of his supporters were refusing to eat in a show of solidarity with him, Navalny said.

“Tears flowed from my eyes when I read that. God, I’m not even acquainted with these people, and they do this for me. Friends, my heart is full of love and gratitude for you, but I don’t want anyone physically suffering because of me,” said the 44-year-old politician, who is Vladimir Putin’s most prominent critic.

Navalny began the hunger strike to protest against prison authorities’ refusal to let his doctors visit after he developed severe back pain and numbness in his legs.

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Who is Alexei Navalny?

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Born in 1976 just outside Moscow, Alexei Navalny is a lawyer-turned-campaigner whose Anti-Corruption Foundation investigates the wealth of Vladimir Putin’s inner circle. 

He started out as a Russian nationalist, but emerged as the main leader of Russia’s democratic opposition during the wave of protests that led up to the 2012 presidential election, and has since been a thorn in the Kremlin’s side. 

Navalny is barred from appearing on state television, but has used social media to his advantage. A 2017 documentary accusing the prime minister, Dmitry Medvedev, of corruption received more than 30m views on YouTube within two months. 

He has been repeatedly arrested and jailed. The European court of human rights ruled that Russia violated Navalny’s rights by holding him under house arrest in 2014. Election officials barred him from running for president in 2018 due to an embezzlement conviction that he claims was politically motivated. Navalny told the commission its decision would be a vote ‘not against me, but against 16,000 people who have nominated me; against 200,000 volunteers who have been canvassing for me‘. 

There has also been a physical price to pay. In April 2017, he was attacked with green dye that nearly blinded him in one eye, and in July 2019 he was taken from jail to hospital with symptoms that one of his doctors said could indicate poisoning. In 2020, he was again hospitalised after a suspected poisoning, and taken to Germany for treatment. The German government later said toxicology results showed Navalny was poisoned with a Novichok nerve agent.

Navalny was sent to prison again in February 2021, sentenced to two years and eight months, in a move that triggered marches in Moscow and the arrest of more than 1,000 protesters. By April he was described as being “seriously ill” in prison.

Photograph: Pavel Golovkin/AP

Officials insisted Navalny was getting the medical help he needed, but Navalny said he had in effect received no treatment.

On Wednesday night, a further round of mass protests demanding his freedom swept across Russia. A top aide said Wednesday night’s protests seemed to have brought a compromise from Russian authorities on getting Navalny the medical help he had demanded when launching the hunger strike.

Navalny was arrested in January upon his return from Germany, where he had spent five months recovering from a nerve agent poisoning he blames on the Kremlin – accusations Russian officials reject.



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