Russian police arrest more than 100 Navalny supporters -group

Police officers detain a demonstrator in Pushkinskaya Square in Moscow, Russia, Sunday, June 4, 2023. (AP)
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  • Navalny, who rose to prominence by lampooning President Vladimir Putin鈥檚 elite and alleging vast corruption, said in April that an 鈥渁bsurd鈥� terrorism case had been opened against him that could see him sentenced to a further 30 years in jail

MOSCOW: Russian police on Sunday arrested more than 100 people who had taken to the streets to mark the 47th birthday of Alexei Navalny, Russia鈥檚 most prominent opposition leader, a protest monitoring group said.
OVD-Info said in a statement that 109 people had been detained in 23 cities as of 10:42 p.m. Moscow time (1942 GMT). Authorities have clamped down heavily on signs of dissent since Russia鈥檚 invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 and in most cities, only a handful of people were held.
Navalny is serving combined sentences of 11-1/2 years for fraud and contempt of court on charges that he said were trumped up to silence him.
Footage from Moscow and St. Petersburg, Russia鈥檚 two largest cities, showed police arresting individual demonstrators. One man could be seen briefly holding up a sign before Moscow police ushered him away, bent over, as he groaned in pain.
Another man, who held up a sign in English that read 鈥淔ree Navalny,鈥� was also arrested in Moscow.
In St. Petersburg, a woman accompanied by a child told reporters that 鈥淚鈥檓 against the war, that鈥檚 why they detained me with my underage kid.鈥�
Navalny, who rose to prominence by lampooning President Vladimir Putin鈥檚 elite and alleging vast corruption, said in April that an 鈥渁bsurd鈥� terrorism case had been opened against him that could see him sentenced to a further 30 years in jail.