In secret journal, Putin’s fiercest critic writes: ‘If your convictions mean something, you must be prepared to stand up for them’
The late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny believed he would die in prison, excerpts from his memoir reveal.
Navalny was the most prominent foe of the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, and relentlessly campaigned against official corruption in Russia. He died in a remote Arctic prison in February while serving a 19-year sentence on several charges, including running an extremist group, which he said were politically motivated.
The New Yorker and the Times have published extracts from his book, Patriot, which will be released on 22 October.
Navalny was jailed in 2021 after returning from Germany where he had been recuperating from a nerve-agent poisoning that he blamed on the Kremlin, and was given three prison terms. Russian officials have vehemently denied involvement in the poisoning and in Navalny’s death.
Patriot was announced in April by the publisher Alfred A Knopf, which called it Navalny’s “final letter to the world”.
