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Putin Critic Gets 5-Year Jail Term, Setting Off Protests Putin Critic Gets 5-Year Jail Term, Setting Off Protests
(about 7 hours later)
KIROV, Russia — The most prominent leader of the Russian opposition movement was sentenced to five years in prison for embezzlement on Thursday, a harsh sentence that seemingly reflected his rise as a political threat to President Vladimir V. Putin. KIROV, Russia — Russia’s most prominent opposition leader was sentenced to five years in prison on Thursday for embezzlement, setting off protests that condemned the verdict as part of a campaign by President Vladimir V. Putin to corral the opposition and block the rise of a popular challenger.
The opposition figure, Aleksei A. Navalny, who famously branded the president’s United Russia political machine the “party of swindlers and thieves,” had grown in stature from his beginnings as an anti-corruption blogger and leader of street protests. He had recently decided to run for mayor of Moscow, though he was given scant chance of winning. Aleksei A. Navalny, who famously branded the president’s United Russia political machine the “party of swindlers and thieves,” was apparently singled out by the Kremlin after having grown in stature from his beginnings as an anticorruption blogger and leader of street protests to a populist candidate for mayor of Moscow.
Mr. Putin has shown a willingness to tolerate a certain amount of dissent, particularly on the Internet. But he has drawn the line at political challenges, as he did with the oil billionaire Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who was imprisoned in 2005 after he began backing independent political parties to challenge the Kremlin. He remains in jail. But it may ultimately be that same popularity — and the threat of further unrest — that keeps him free for at least some time. In what has the fingerprints of a politically designed plan, the public prosecutor, shortly after the handcuffed prisoner was led away, called on the judge to allow his release on Friday pending his appeal. That could keep Mr. Navalny out of prison for more than a month, perhaps temporarily neutralizing the anger at the verdict while allowing him to run for mayor in September.
Mr. Navalny has said he wants to be president one day, but he posed a different sort of threat, a steadily growing popularity combined with an incorruptibility that made him impossible to co-opt and a relentless effort to embarrass officials by disclosing their corrupt dealings. As crowds of demonstrators swirled near Manezh Square in Moscow on Thursday night, Dmitri Gudkov, a political opposition leader and member of Parliament who attended Mr. Navalny’s sentencing, wrote on Twitter: “Tomorrow morning he may be released. Manezh, this is thanks to you!” That was later confirmed by Vadim Kobzev, Mr. Navalny’s lawyer, who called it “a clearly political decision.”
As night fell in Moscow, thousands of protesters gathered in Manezh Square, a rare mass demonstration in the months since the government increased the penalties for unsanctioned gatherings. Lacking a permit, they were encircled by police in green camouflage, who quickly began making scattered arrests. The Navalny case has captivated Moscow. When speaking before a crowd, Mr. Navalny projects a raw, common-man’s charisma. He was the point person in a popular opposition movement in which huge numbers of demonstrators poured into the streets demanding the rule of law and political reform. But when Mr. Putin returned to the presidency, his crackdown managed to discourage or frighten many of Mr. Navalny’s supporters — young, professional, tech-savvy Russians — into silence.
As the crowd swirled near Red Square, Dmitri Gudkov, a political opposition leader and member of Parliament who attended Mr. Navalny’s sentencing, posted a message on Twitter saying that prosecutors had asked that Mr. Navalny be released, with travel restrictions, until his sentence takes effect, following a mandatory appeal. Mr. Navalny, however, refused to be cowed, and while others fled to preserve their freedom, he willingly stood trial.
“Tomorrow morning he may be released,” Mr. Gudkov wrote. “Manezh, this is thanks to you!” The sentence represented a threshold for the Kremlin. For the past 12 years, Russian authorities typically refrained from using blunt force to sideline political challengers. Opposition members would be banned from government-controlled television, overwhelmingly the most powerful influence on public opinion. They would be co-opted with jobs or platforms, discredited by the release of embarrassing material or jailed with 15-day administrative sentences.
Mr. Navalny, a 37-year-old lawyer, had long dismissed the trial as a charade based on trumped-up charges, a contention backed by the United States and the European Union. He remained defiant to the end, spending much of the three-hour session in a local court here posting messages and photos on Twitter, ignoring an order from the judge, Sergei Blinov, to shut off all cellphones, and denouncing the evidence against him as “falsified.” But Mr. Navalny’s sentence was a rare case in which a political opposition leader was transparently silenced using Russia’s criminal justice system.
Before being led out in handcuffs, he sent followers one last message: “O.K. Don’t miss me. And most importantly — do not be lazy.” Referring to the Russian government, he added, “The toad will not remove itself from the oil pipeline.” “I think it’s always hard to say which point is the bifurcation point, the threshold after which there is irreversibility,” said Sergei Guriev, a public supporter of Mr. Navalny’s and a prominent Russian economist who recently fled to France, fearing his own political prosecution. “But this is certainly one of the big moves.”
If his conviction is upheld on appeal, Mr. Navalny will be prohibited for life from holding public office. “The message is that whatever you do, even if you do socially useful things, if you are in opposition to the government, you are going to jail,” Mr. Guriev said. He added: “He is the face of the Russian opposition. He is the face of the younger generation. What happens to him determines the future of Russia.”
The case here in Kirov was the most high-profile of a series of politically charged prosecutions of Mr. Navalny and other opposition figures in recent months, as the Kremlin has demonstrated its willingness to use the judicial system for political retribution undeterred by criticism, at home or abroad. The verdict incited some calls for boycotts of the Moscow mayoral election and future national ballots, and drew cries of alarm from the West. Mr. Putin has shown a willingness to tolerate a certain amount of dissent, particularly on the Internet. But he has drawn the line at political challenges, as he did with the oil billionaire Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who was imprisoned in 2005 after he began backing independent political parties to oppose the Kremlin. He remains in prison.
Depending on how history unfolds, the verdict may have ended Mr. Navalny’s political career or sealed its future success. But the prospect of a lengthy jail term immediately catapulted him from opposition activist into the ranks of Russian dissidents, the first among that historic archetype to use the Internet and social media as his main weapon against the state. For many in Russia, the sentence seemed to mark a turning point. Mr. Navalny, 37, a lawyer, had long dismissed the trial as a charade based on trumped-up charges, a contention backed by the United States and the European Union. He remained defiant, spending much of the three-hour session in a local court here posting messages and photographs on Twitter, ignoring an order from Judge Sergei Blinov to shut off all cellphones and denouncing the evidence against him as “falsified.”
“I think it’s always hard to say which point is the bifurcation point, the threshold after which there is irreversibility,” said Sergei Guriev, a public supporter of Mr. Navalny and prominent Russian economist who recently fled to France fearing his own political prosecution. “But this is certainly one of the big moves.” Before being led out of court, he sent followers one last message: “O.K. Don’t miss me. And most importantly — do not be lazy.”
“The message is that whatever you do, even if you do socially useful things, if you are in opposition to the government, you are going to jail,” Mr. Guriev said. He added, “Everyone in the government knows who Navalny is. Everyone in the government reads his blog. He is the face of the Russian opposition. He is the face of the younger generation. What happens to him determines the future of Russia.” If his conviction is upheld on appeal, Mr. Navalny will be banned from public office for life. He has said he wants to be president one day, but he posed a different sort of threat: a steadily growing popularity combined with an incorruptibility that made him impossible to co-opt and a relentlessness in embarrassing officials by disclosing their corrupt dealings.
While some supporters expressed surprise that the Kremlin would go so far as to jail Mr. Navalny, his sentencing fits a pattern that Mr. Putin has set since returning to the presidency, of harshly cracking down on dissent, limiting foreign influences and showing little regard for what the rest of the world thinks. The case here in Kirov was the most high-profile in a series of politically charged prosecutions of Mr. Navalny and other opposition figures in recent months, as the Kremlin has shown its willingness to use the judicial system for political retribution undeterred by criticism at home or abroad. The verdict incited some calls for boycotts of the Moscow mayoral election and future national ballots, and drew cries of alarm from the West. While the verdict could eventually prove either to end Mr. Navalny’s political career or seal its future success, for many in Russia it seemed to be a turning point.
From the stiff sentences meted out last year to the members of the girl punk band Pussy Riot for their stunt protest in a Moscow cathedral, to his public musing about granting asylum to the fugitive former intelligence contractor Edward J. Snowden, Mr. Putin has made clear that Russia’s values are its own and that the rest of the world will not tell him what to do. The United States and the European Union condemned the verdict. Jay Carney, the White House spokesman, said the “United States is deeply disappointed and concerned” by the conviction and called the charges “politically motivated.” He added, “Navalny’s harsh prison sentence is the latest example of a disturbing trend of government actions aimed at suppressing dissent and civil society in Russia.”
The United States and the European Union condemned the verdict. “We are deeply disappointed in the conviction of Navalny and the apparent political motivations in this trial,” the American ambassador in Russia, Michael A. McFaul, wrote in a Twitter message. President Obama has indicated that he may cancel a trip to Russia in September, in part because of this verdict, and the standoff over Edward J. Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor seeking asylum in Russia.
Catherine Ashton, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, issued a statement saying the verdict “raises serious concerns as to the state of the rule of law in Russia.”Catherine Ashton, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, issued a statement saying the verdict “raises serious concerns as to the state of the rule of law in Russia.”
Jailing Mr. Navalny poses special risks for the Kremlin. Handsome, with angular features and dimple in his square chin, Mr. Navalny holds political views that include a nationalist streak. His wife, Yulia, tall and blonde, exudes Russian beauty and they have two adorable children, a daughter, Dasha, 11, and son, Zakhar, 5. With the stiff sentences meted out last year to members of the punk band Pussy Riot for a stunt protest in a Moscow cathedral and Mr. Putin’s public musing about granting asylum to Mr. Snowden, the president has made clear that Russia’s values are its own and that the rest of the world will not tell him what to do.
Unlike Mr. Khodorkovsky, the former Yukos oil tycoon, Mr. Navalny does not carry the baggage of being a billionaire oligarch. He is strictly a political creature, whose main role has been in exposing public corruption and helping lead a series of large street protests in Moscow following the disputed parliamentary elections of December 2011. As the five-year prison sentence was delivered, some of Mr. Navalny’s supporters burst into tears. He turned and hugged his wife, then shook hands with some supporters before being led away by guards. Mr. Navalny’s parents were also in the courtroom, and at one point bickered with bailiffs who complained that they were not standing up.
As the five-year prison sentence was delivered, and the judge said that it could not be suspended but required actual jail time, some of Mr. Navalny’s supporters burst into tears. He turned and hugged his wife, then shook hands with some supporters before being led away by guards. Mr. Navalny’s elderly parents were also in the courtroom, and at one point bickered with bailiffs who complained that they were not standing up. Outside the court, Mr. Navalny’s wife, Yulia, said that his work would not be halted.
After the sentencing, Mr. Navalny’s longtime press secretary, Anna Veduta, sat on a bench in the courthouse with tears streaming down her face. Ms. Navalny sat beside her, dry-eyed and stone-faced but slightly pale. They remained there for about 10 minutes before leaving through a back exit. Outside the court, Ms. Navalny said that her husband’s work would not be halted.
“Aleksei was as ready for this as one can be,” she said. “If anyone believes that Aleksei’s investigations will cease, that is not the case. The Fund for the Fight Against Corruption will continue working as before.”“Aleksei was as ready for this as one can be,” she said. “If anyone believes that Aleksei’s investigations will cease, that is not the case. The Fund for the Fight Against Corruption will continue working as before.”
While the guilty verdict was widely expected, the charges against Mr. Navalny, of stealing nearly $500,000 from a state-controlled timber company, were considered thin by many legal experts and had previously been thrown out as baseless after a local investigation. The case was resurrected by federal officials in Moscow and the Kremlin had made little effort to mask the political motivation of the prosecution. While the guilty verdict was widely expected, the charges against Mr. Navalny, of stealing nearly $500,000 from a state-controlled timber company, were considered thin by many legal experts and had been thrown out as baseless after a local investigation. The case was resurrected by federal officials in Moscow, and the Kremlin had made little effort to mask the political motivation of the prosecution.
A spokesman for the federal Investigative Committee, Vladimir Markin, declared publicly that Mr. Navalny had made himself a target through his political activities criticizing public officials.A spokesman for the federal Investigative Committee, Vladimir Markin, declared publicly that Mr. Navalny had made himself a target through his political activities criticizing public officials.
“If a person tries with all his strength to attract attention, or if I can put it, teases authorities — ‘Look at me, I’m so good compared to everyone else’ — well, then interest in his past grows and the process of exposing him naturally speeds up,” Mr. Markin said.“If a person tries with all his strength to attract attention, or if I can put it, teases authorities — ‘Look at me, I’m so good compared to everyone else’ — well, then interest in his past grows and the process of exposing him naturally speeds up,” Mr. Markin said.
Mr. Navalny was convicted along with a co-defendant, Pyotr Ofitserov, a businessman and acquaintance who had worked with him on the timber project when Mr. Navalny worked as an unpaid adviser to the regional governor here. Mr. Ofitserov, a father of five who has not been politically active, was sentenced to four years in prison. The two men were also each fined more than $15,000. Mr. Navalny was convicted along with a co-defendant, Pyotr Ofitserov, a businessman who had worked with him on the timber project when Mr. Navalny was an unpaid adviser to the regional governor here. Mr. Ofitserov, a father of five who has not been politically active, was sentenced to four years in prison. Each man was also fined more than $15,000.
The judge’s findings were largely based on the testimony of a third man accused in the scheme, Vyacheslav Opalev, who pleaded guilty and worked with the prosecution. The judge’s findings were largely based on the testimony of a third man accused in the case, Vyacheslav Opalev, who pleaded guilty and worked with the prosecution. In his decision, Judge Blinov called Mr. Opalev’s testimony trustworthy and reliable. But during the trial, Mr. Opalev at times gave contradictory evidence, and defense lawyers were not allowed to cross-examine him. In addition, Judge Blinov barred the defense from calling 13 witnesses.
In his decision, Judge Blinov called Mr. Opalev’s testimony trustworthy and reliable. But during the trial, Mr. Opalev at times gave contradictory evidence, and defense lawyers were not allowed to cross-examine him. In addition, Judge Blinov barred the defense from calling 13 witnesses. The crime novelist Boris Akunin, who is also a political opposition leader, said the verdict showed there was little hope of changing Russia by democratic means.
Unless the conviction is reversed on appeal, which seems unlikely, the verdict stood to disqualify Mr. Navalny from the Moscow mayoral election, which will be held in September. The incumbent, Sergei S. Sobyanin, was widely favored to win, even if Mr. Navalny had not been convicted. Still, many said the prosecution was partly intended to keep him off the ballot and to end his political career. “Lifetime deprivation of elections — this is what the verdict means, not only for Navalny but for all who thought it was possible to change this system through elections,” Mr. Akunin wrote. “As long as the Putin regime is alive, there will not be elections.”
Aleksei L. Kudrin, a close associate of Mr. Putin and former finance minister, described it on Twitter as “looking less like a punishment than an attempt to isolate him from social life and the electoral process.”

Reporting was contributed by Ellen Barry, Andrew E. Kramer, Andrew Roth, Alexandra Kozlova, Anna Tikhomirova and Noah Sneider from Moscow.

The crime novelist Boris Akunin, who is also a political opposition leader, said the verdict showed there was little hope to change Russia by democratic means.
“Lifetime deprivation of elections — this is what the verdict means not only for Navalny but for all who thought it was possible to change this system through elections,” Mr. Akunin wrote. “As long as the Putin regime is alive, there will not be elections. The answer to the question ‘To be, or not to be’ that is to boycott or not boycott, has been answered. For other elections as well.”

Reporting was contributed from Moscow by Ellen Barry, Andrew E. Kramer, Andrew Roth, Alexandra Kozlova, Anna Tikhomirova and Noah Sneider.