Wed 20 October 2021:
The European Parliament awarded the Sakharov Prize for Human Rights to Alexei Navalny, a jailed Russian opposition activist.
The award was described by Navalny’s organization as a victory for all supporters of “truth.”
“The Sakharov Price is, of course, an award for you all. To all the people who are not indifferent, who even in the darkest of times are not afraid to speak the truth,” Navalny’s FBK anti-corruption foundation said on Twitter.
In a tweet, the parliament’s right-of-centre EPP group announced the prize and called on Russian President Vladimir Putin “to free Alexei Navalny. Europe calls for his — and all other political prisoners’ — freedom”.
Last year’s award of the 50,000-euro ($58,000) prize went to the movement opposing President Alexander Lukashenko in Belarus, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Aleksei Navalny, a leading Russian opposition activist and founder of the Anti-Corruption Foundation, collapsed while flying from Tomsk (Siberia) to Moscow on 20 August 2020. He was transferred to Germany for treatment where he spent 18 days in a coma.
After his return to Moscow on 17 January 2021, Aleksei Navalny was arrested and sentenced to serve 2,5 years in a penal colony for violating the probation terms of his earlier, politically motivated sentence.
The Anti-Corruption Foundation and the “Navalny Headquarters” support network were listed as “extremist” and banned. On 11 August 2021, Navalny was additionally charged with “creation of a non-profit organization undermining rights of citizens”, under an obscure article of the Russian Criminal Code. He faces an additional prison sentence of up to three years if found guilty.
(with agency)
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