Russia: A peculiar sentence for Aleksei Navalny

On 30 December 2014 a Moscow court ruled in the case of Aleksei Navalny and his brother Oleg on a charge of embezzling from Yves Rocher (Oleg’s company provided the company with courier services). Aleksei Navalny was sentenced to 3½ years, suspended for three years, and his brother to 3½ years in prison without parole. On the day of the judgement a spontaneous rally was held in Moscow in support of the Navalny brothers, which amassed from 1500 to 5000 participants. Similar actions also took place in several other Russian cities, although these were even smaller. Navalny himself announced the organisation of protest rallies in major Russian cities over the coming months.

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