As the world learns of the death murder of Alexy Navalny, one of — if not the — most outspoken and active critics of Vladimir Putin, I find myself filled with a multitude of emotions.
Anger. Disbelief. Sadness. Frustration. Denial.
In 2020, Alexy Navalny was poisoned with a nerve agent that nearly killed him. This, of course, was done by an agent of Putin, though his regime denies that to this day.
The rest of the world knew. It was obvious.
Miraculously, Navalny recovered from this attempt on his life. Then he decided to return to Russia. Upon his arrival, he was taken into custody.
Since that time, we’ve seen hunger strikes. We’ve seen illnesses. We’ve seen periods in which Navalny was nowhere to be found, according to his lawyers. We’ve watched as he had more time added to his already-ridiculous sentence because of trumped up charges that in themselves were laughable. We’ve watched as Navalny has been shuffled from prison to prison and penal colony to penal colony.
It’s all been an unbelievable, horrible, miscarriage of justice, but in a country that has been under a dictatorship since 1999 (with a brief pause from 2009-2011), it’s simply just the status quo.
Anyone who presents even the smallest of threats to Putin’s stranglehold on the Russian people ends up dead murdered.
They end up accidentally falling getting thrown out of windows.
They end up dying of mysterious illnesses being poisoned with nerve agents and other ghastly chemicals.
And, as we’ve seen today, they end up collapsing and dying murdered in penal colonies.
I believe that anyone who knows about Navalny’s history with Putin — and anyone who knows about Putin’s past in general — absolutely knew this day was coming. Because it always does.
One can fight against/oppose the dictatorship valiantly for years, but in the end, we learn of their death murder. And in Russia, we can safely assume that each of these deaths murders come at the hand of Vladimir Putin.
The level of fear experienced by the people in Russia is real. I believe that. But I hope that someone will pick up where Alexy Navalny has left off, that someone else will pick up and carry that torch.
Why? Because the Russian people deserve better. The world deserves better.