“If you want to go to Navalny’s funeral, wear a protective medical mask, put on a hood or hat and do not wear conspicuous clothing,” a Telegram channel said on Thursday. “Be sure to arrive on time!”
The ceremony for Alexei Navalny is scheduled for 2 p.m. Moscow time (12 p.m. here) in a church in the Marjino district, where he used to live. The mourners are supposed to walk past the open coffin to pay their last respects. This will be followed by the burial at the Borisovskoe Cemetery, a half-hour walk from the church. Navalny’s spokeswoman, Kira Yarmish, asks that everyone to whom Navalny meant something come to the funeral.
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Showdown
Navalny’s funeral ceremony could well be a showdown between the authorities and the many sympathizers expected. At the funeral of the shot opposition politician Boris Nemtsov in 2015, thousands of people stood in the cold for hours to pay him their last respects. But then the death of an opponent was still allowed to be publicly mourned. Now the government is sparing no effort to thwart Navalny’s funeral. First she tried to blackmail his mother by only handing over the body if she promised that he would be buried secretly, then all the event halls canceled the ceremony and on Thursday evening Navalny’s team found no funeral director willing to provide a hearse.
Camera’s
In the meantime, the police have installed cameras everywhere in the church of the funeral ceremony and signs stating that it is forbidden to make video recordings. Navalny’s team plans to broadcast the ceremony live on their YouTube channel. Devices may have been installed in the church and cemetery that could disrupt the recordings.
The metro exit at the cemetery was closed and iron gates were placed everywhere. A massive police presence is expected, because for Putin this ceremony should under no circumstances turn into a major demonstration. In Russia, demonstrations or mass events are prohibited, security forces can rely on the law to arrest anyone who does not belong to the family. It is unclear which family members will come to Moscow for the funeral ceremony. Widow Yulia Navalnaya faces the risk of arrest when she arrives in Russia.
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Mandela
It will be exciting on Friday as many appear willing to brave the strict security measures and restrictions to say goodbye to Navalny. The way the regime dealt with the anti-corruption activist has shocked many. In 2020, the secret service administered a lethal dose of novichok, which he barely survived. When he returned to Russia after his recovery abroad, he was arrested and put behind bars for years. He died there unexpectedly in February. His family and his team say the 47-year-old opponent was murdered. The European Parliament, where Navalny’s widow gave a speech on Wednesday, holds Putin responsible.
Navalny’s death came as a shock to the opposition. “He had survived so many attacks, he looked like a Nelson Mandela who could live forever,” Russian politician Margarita Zavadskaya said recently. “With his death the last glimmer of hope disappeared.” The funeral ceremony is the opportunity for Kremlin critics to demonstrate their aversion to the regime.
Elections
In the Kremlin, Putin rules as if nothing has happened. In his annual address to the nation, he made no reference to Navalny. He warned Western countries that nuclear weapons would be ready if they sent troops to Ukraine and he appeased his electorate – the poor, the pensioners and the low-level civil servants – with expensive financial promises that would be fulfilled after the elections. He called the Russians who have gone to the front “the new elite of the country” and promised financial support to the soldiers’ relatives. He did not talk about demobilization, something for which so many soldiers’ wives are campaigning.
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The rosy picture he painted of his country and the bright prospects for the coming years are difficult to reconcile with a budget that has less income from gas and oil and spends more than a third on defense.
In two weeks there will be presidential elections, which Putin will undoubtedly win. But for the Kremlin it is important that the elections have a high turnout to give his re-election great legitimacy. The Kremlin had also hoped that the weeks before the elections could pass in peace, but now the opposition wants to use Navalny’s funeral to raise a clenched fist at the Kremlin.