Mother of Russias opposition, Alexei Navalny defies secret burial, demands body
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Alexei Navalny mother Lyudmila accuse Russian officials of planning to bury her son in secret without a funeral
Alexei Navalny mother Lyudmila accuse Russian officials of planning to bury her son in secret without a funeral.
Lyudmila Navalnaya, the mother of prominent Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, has spoken out against the authorities’ attempts to force her into a secret burial for her son.
In a statement on Thursday, Lyudmila Navalnaya revealed that she was allowed to see her son’s body at the city morgue and reiterated her demand for his body to be released to her.
“They want this to be done secretly, with no farewell. They want to bring me to the edge of a cemetery, to a fresh grave and say: here lies your son. I don’t agree to this,” she said in a YouTube video.
Authorities’ Pressure and Blackmail Lyudmila Navalnaya described the intense pressure she has been facing from the authorities, who are attempting to blackmail her into agreeing to a secretive burial.
She expressed her opposition to their plans to conduct the burial without a proper mourning ceremony and emphasized her desire for people who cared about Alexei to have the opportunity to bid him farewell.
Kira Yarmysh, Navalny’s spokesperson, disclosed on social media that Lyudmila Navalnaya was presented with a medical certificate stating that her son’s death was due to “natural causes.”
However, no specific details about the nature of these causes were provided.
Navalny, 47, Russia’s best-known opposition politician, died suddenly in an Arctic penal colony last week.
His aides and family have alleged that the Kremlin murdered him, an allegation the Kremlin has rejected.
Navalny’s mother said she had been taken to a morgue on Wednesday evening to see his body.
“The investigators claim that they know the cause of death, they have all the medical and legal documents ready, which I saw, and I signed the medical death certificate,” she said.
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“According to the law, they should have given me Alexei’s body right away, but they have not done so until now. Instead, they are blackmailing me, setting me conditions on where, when and how Alexei should be buried. This is illegal.”
Navalny’s mother said: “I’m recording this video because they started threatening me. Looking into my eyes, they say that if I don’t agree to a secret funeral, they will do something with my son’s body.”
She quoted one of the investigators as saying: “Time is not on your side, corpses decompose.”
“I don’t want special conditions,” she said. “I just want everything to be done according to the law. I demand that my son’s body be returned to me immediately.”
The Kremlin has said it had nothing to do with Navalny’s death, and that the circumstances are being investigated. President Vladimir Putin has yet to comment on it.
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