European leaders have condemned the Kremlin’s “ultimate responsibility” in the death of Alexei Navalny, as supporters of Russia’s best-known opposition politician held remembrance events a year after he died in an Arctic penal colony.
A steady queue of people braved freezing temperatures and possible arrest in Moscow to visit Navalny’s grave in Borisovskoye cemetery, while his widow, Yulia Navalnaya, was due to address a memorial ceremony in Berlin, where she is living in exile.
The German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, paid tribute to Navalny on Sunday, saying Vladimir Putin’s most significant challenger to date had died “because he fought for democracy and freedom in Russia”.
Putin “brutally combats freedom and its defenders. Navalny’s work was all the more brave,” Scholz said in a social media post. “His courage made a difference and reaches far beyond his death.”
Kaja Kallas, the EU’s foreign policy chief, said Putin bore “ultimate responsibility” for Navalny’s death. Navalny “gave his life for a free and democratic Russia”, she said, calling for the release of all political prisoners in the country.
“As Russia intensifies its illegal war of aggression against Ukraine, it also continues its internal repression, targeting those who stand for democracy,” Kallas said, adding that Navalny’s lawyers and “hundreds of others … remain unjustly imprisoned”.
In a video released on Sunday, Navalnaya said opposition supporters “know why we are fighting: for a future Russia free, peaceful and beautiful. The one Alexei dreamed of is possible; do everything to make his dream come true.”
Navalnaya, a leading figure in Russia’s weakened and fractured opposition, most of whose members are now in exile, accused Putin of trying to “erase our memory of Alexei’s name, of hiding the truth about his murder and forcing us to give up”.
She said: “Everyone can do something: protest, write to political prisoners, change the minds of those close to you, support each other. Alexei inspires people … who understand that our country is not just about war, corruption and oppression.”
Navalny died aged 47 on 16 February last year in the Polar Wolf penal colony in Kharp, to where he had been transferred in 2023. He was arrested in 2021 after returning to Russia from medical treatment in Germany for novichok nerve agent poisoning.
He was declared an “extremist” by Russian authorities, meaning anyone who mentions his name or that of his Anti-Corruption Foundation without also saying they are “extremist” can be fined or, for repeat offences, jailed for up to four years.
Participation in an organisation designated as “extremist” is punishable by up to six years in prison, and even public displays of “symbols” of an extremist organisation – including photos of Navalny or his name – risk a fine or stint in a police cell.
Despite posts on pro-Kremlin Telegram channels warning of “Big Brother and his ever-watchful eye” and including a photo of a security camera sign at the cemetery, several hundred people gathered at Borisovskoye on Sunday, an Agence France-Presse reporter said.
Russia has never fully explained Navalny’s death, which came less than a month before a presidential election that extended Putin’s more than two-decade rule, saying only that it happened as he was walking in the prison yard.
The opposition figurehead had continued to call for Russians to oppose the Kremlin and denounced Moscow’s Ukraine offensive, even from behind bars. “I took the decision not to be afraid,” he wrote in his autobiography published after his death.
