Jubilee Post News & Views
Jubilee News Desk
Russia expelled three diplomats from Germany, Sweden and Poland for joining protests in support of opposition activist Alexei Navalny.
Navalny is a vocal critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Navalny, 44, is a political activist who has campaigned against corruption and Putin since 2011. Navalny accuses Putin of running an administration riddled with corruption.
The Russian foreign ministry said the three took part in illegal demonstrations on January 23. Sweden called the expulsion “totally unfounded” and denied its diplomat had participated in any demonstration.
The expulsion of the diplomats was announced Friday, hours after EU foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell met Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in Moscow. Hundreds of thousands of people took part in protests in support of Navalny across Russia on 23 and 31 January. Thousands of participants were arrested.
The German foreign ministry denounced the expulsion as being “in no way justified” and said it would retaliate if Russia did not reconsider.
Last August he was poisoned with a nerve agent in eastern Russia and taken to Germany for treatment. He returned home at the end of January, despite warnings from the Russian government that he would be arrested.
Navalny was then jailed for three-and-a-half years for what prosecutors said was a violation of the terms of a suspended sentence for fraud in 2014.
Shortly after his return to Russia, he released a YouTube video featuring an opulent Black Sea palace which, he alleged, was a Russian billionaires’ gift to the president. More than 100 million people have watched the video.
