Alexei Navalny detained after returning to Russia
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Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny has been arrested at the Moscow airport, after flying back to Russia five months after being poisoned with the deadly nerve agent Novichok .
Local media has reported that Navalny was detained at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport “for multiple violations of his suspended sentence”.
Navalny, who almost died from the poisoning and recovered in a German hospital, boarded a plane from Berlin to Moscow this aftenroon with his wife Yulia.
It is believed that Russia’s FSB security agency was responsible for the poisoning, with an increasing body of evidence proving that Vladimir Putin’s government ordered the attempted killing.
The Putin critic was detained by Russian officials when going through customs at the airport for allegedly failing to attend a parole hearing for a 2014 offence.
Navalny has been consistently arrested on trumped up charges by the Russian authorities.
Alexei Navalny’s spokesperson Kira Yarmysh tweeted: “Until recently, it was impossible to believe they [the authorities] were so scared. But here’s the confirmation.”
Speaking to reporters on the plane earlier, Navalny said he was “extremely happy” to be going home and that he did not expect to be imprisoned.
“I have every right to go back,” he said.
“I don’t expect anything to happen. Nothing will occur.”
Large crowds have gathered at Vnukovo Airport in Moscow to welcome back Navalny, but the plane was diverted to Sheremetyevo Airport.
It has been reported that about half a million Russians have been watching Navalny’s journey on an online flight map.
Navalny was poisoned with deadly nerve agent Novichok on 20 August this year, and was hospitalised in a serious condition.
The Russian opposition figure and vocal Putin critic was put in a coma but survived.
Russian prosecutors refused to open an official criminal investigation into Navalny’s poisoning, claiming they found no sign that a crime had been committed.