Amnesty International has restored the status of a prisoner of conscience to Alexei Navalny, a prisoner imprisoned in Russia, in a statement posted on the organisation’s website on Friday.
This status was withdrawn for the opposition in February, when the organization announced that the politician had identified “hate speech” in statements made in previous years.
Read more: A lawyer from the Navalny Foundation has been detained in Moscow
This assessment by Amnesty International has caused confusion among many human rights activists in Russia and elsewhere.
A statement on the organisation’s website said on Friday that Navalny’s status as a prisoner of conscience was reaffirmed, while stressing the need to respect his rights.
The situation with Navalna has led the organization to review its internal rules, the statement said.
The organization has begun a review of the general approach to how the term is used.
As a preliminary measure, the organization has decided not to exclude repressed activists and fighters from the list of prisoners of conscience for the rights of opposition politicians because of their past events.
Nor has Amnesty International indicated exactly which statements by Navalny it decided to deprive the politician of prisoner of conscience status.-
According to Radio Brīvība, it is probably about the statements of the opposition at a time when he positioned himself as a Russian nationalist.
In 2007, the opposition, together with writer Zahar Priipepin and politician Sergei Gulayev, formed the nationalist organization Narod. The organization launched a provocative advertisement criticizing migrants.
Navalni will then be expelled from the Jabloko party on charges of nationalism and “political harm”.
Proponents of Navalny now explain that disputes over Amnesty International’s status as an opposition have been initiated by the Russian authorities.
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