Russian authorities have issued an arrest warrant for Alexei Navalny's brother Oleg, hours after the unexplained death of the Russian opposition leader and adversary of Vladimir Putin.
With the Russian president held responsible for the death of 47-year-old Alexei Navalny, who has been in a Siberian prison since 2021, according to media reports, the Kremlin is now targeting his brother, according to a Russian media outlet. which is close to the regime of Moscow, according to the British newspaper "Express".
As reported by the Russian media "TASS", the country's Ministry of the Interior announced yesterday that Oleg Anatolyevich Navalny "is wanted under an article of the Criminal Code" and that he was added to the list of persons wanted by the Russian authorities.
Alexei Navalny's brother, Oleg, is facing new charges, with Russia issuing an arrest warrant, British media reports.
While Alexei's mother is asking Putin to hand over Alexei's body to her, Moscow - according to the "Tass" agency - issued a statement, according to which it considers Oleg Navalny "wanted under an article of the Criminal Code".
Oleg has faced criminal charges in the past. He was put on the wanted list in 2022 over a rally he attended to protest his brother's arrest in 2021. He was then accused of breaching coronavirus regulations.
He was initially given a one-year suspended sentence, but Russian prison officials asked for it to be commuted to a year in prison, claiming he had skipped probation meetings.
It is believed that Oleg remains in exile from Russia although many believe he has found refuge in Cyprus.
Without specifying the reasons why his name was added to the list of wanted by the Russian authorities, the state media "TASS" recalled that the "Preobrazhensky" court of Moscow had already sentenced Oleg to a one-year prison sentence suspended in 2021 , on the charge of organizing an "unauthorized gathering".
There were calls for Oleg's sentence to be commuted, but he eventually managed to escape from Russia.
In 2014, Oleg was also sentenced to over three years in prison for fraud in a case related to the Russian subsidiary of the French cosmetics company 'Yves Rocher'. He was released from prison in 2018.
The death of his brother, Alexei, was announced by Russia's prison service last Friday, with Russian authorities saying he died while walking around the prison and at one point felt "unwell".
However, his wife Yulia Navalny has accused Russian strongman Vladimir Putin of poisoning her husband and then hiding his body.
"Aides and cowards are now hiding his body, not showing it, not giving it to his mother and pathetically lying while they wait for the traces of novichok, the nerve agent with which Putin tried to poison him again, to disappear," he said the mother of their two children.
“My husband couldn't 'break'. And that's exactly why Putin killed him. Ashamed, cowardly, who didn't dare to look him in the eyes or even just say his name," Yulia added.
Navalny's family has been told his body will be held by authorities for two weeks for "chemical analysis".
The 47-year-old opposition leader was a fierce critic of the Kremlin and had published numerous investigations into corruption at the heart of Russian politics.
In 2020, Alexei survived being poisoned with the nerve agent novichok while on a flight.
He had fallen into a coma before being flown to Berlin for treatment at his wife's request. He stayed for many months in the intensive care unit and when he recovered, he decided to return to his home country. As soon as he set foot on Russian soil, the authorities immediately arrested him.
Source: protothema.gr