Kira Yarmish, lawyer of the deceased Russian opponent Alexei Navalni, denounced this Monday that the Russian authorities have his family was denied access to the body for the third consecutive day and have extended the investigation period into the causes of his death. «Alexei’s mother and her lawyers arrived at the morgue early in the day. “They have not been allowed to enter,” Yarmish said through his account on the social network X. “One of the lawyers has literally been removed by force,” he added.
“When the staff was asked if Alexei’s body was there, they did not respond,” he said, before adding that “the Investigative Committee has informed his mother and lawyers that the investigation into Navalny’s death has been extended.” ».
Thus, Yarmish stressed that “they do not say how long it will last” and added that “The cause of death remains ‘unknown’.” “They lie, they buy time and they don’t even hide it,” he highlighted, three days after the Russian Penitentiary Service announced the death of the opponent in prison.
About 400 people have been arrested during the spontaneous demonstrations in several cities in the country in protest of the death of Navalni, as indicated by the NGO OVD-Info, specialized in monitoring arrests, which added that six of them have been “attacked” in custody .
The Federal Penitentiary Service of the Russian autonomous district of Yamalia-Nenetssia announced on Friday the death of Navalny, who was imprisoned for several convictions against him, after “feeling unwell during a walk.” Moscow has rejected criticism of his death and has asked to wait for the results of the autopsy.
The 47-year-old activist, who was on the list of individuals and organizations involved in terrorist or extremist activists in Russia, had been imprisoned since his arrest in January 2021 when he returned to Moscow from Berlin, where he had been recovering from a poisoning that he and Western governments blamed Russian President Vladimir Putin’s security service.
2024-02-19 09:17:47
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