Russian Opposition Leader Alexei Navalny, 47, Has Died

Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, 47, died Friday in an arctic prison colony, the country’s prison service announced.

“On February 16, 2024, in penal colony No. 3, convict A.A. Navalny felt unwell after a walk, almost immediately losing consciousness,” the statement said of the Putin critic’s death at Kharp, which is in the Yamal-Nanets Autonomous Region.

“The facility’s medical workers immediately arrived at the scene and an emergency medical team was called in. All necessary resuscitation measures have been carried out, but they did not yield positive results. Emergency medics confirmed the death of the convict,” the statement added.

Navalny was poisoned with a military nerve agent while on a business trip in Russia in 2020 — an attempt on his life that he blamed directly on Putin — and spent his final years behind bars as the Russian leader reshaped the country to rally behind his war in Ukraine. News of his death, which comes as the Kremlin is preparing to orchestrate another election victory for Putin in March, drew condemnation from the West.

Navalny was serving a combined 30 ½-year jail sentence when he died. He went missing in Russia's penal system in December, eventually turning up at a high-security penal colony in a remote town above the Arctic Circle. [...]

There was no immediate information about what exactly caused Navalny's death, with the region's investigative committee saying it has launched a "procedural investigation."

Navalny's allies have long raised concerns about his health and poor conditions in jail, where they said he had to spend many days in crammed "punishment cells" for the most minor of conduct violations. But he appeared healthy as he addressed a court via video link from the penal colony Thursday. (NBC News)

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Navalny’s mother said he had appeared “healthy and happy” just days earlier. 

“I don’t want to hear any condolences. We saw him in prison on the (Feb) 12, in a meeting. He was alive, healthy and happy," Lyudmila Navalnaya said on Facebook, according to Reuters. 

Secretary of State Antony Blinken reacted to Navalny's death, saying the news "only underscores the weakness and rot at the heart of the system that Putin has built. Russia is responsible for this."