JK Rowling, Benedict Cumberbatch, Salman Rushdie and other world figures urge Putin to free Alexei Navalny
The signatories, which included actors Jude Law and Benedict Cumberbatch, and writers Margaret Atwood, JK Rowling and Salman Rushdie, said in a letter, 'He has been consistently returned to solitary confinement, (and) squeezed into a concrete cell the size of a dog kennel, with no ventilation'
Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny is seen on a screen via video link from a penal colony in the Vladimir Region during a hearing at the Basmanny district court in Moscow. Reuters
Many coveted celebrity figures, including writers and actors, have urged Russian President Vladimir Putin to release his critic and opposition politician Alexei Navalny.
Joining the appeal are world figures like Nobel prize-winning writers Svetlana Alexievich, JM Coetzee, Herta Mueller, Orhan Pamuk, Olga Tokarczuk and Mario Vargas Llosa.
Navalny, a former lawyer who rose to prominence by lampooning Putin’s elite and alleging vast corruption, is serving sentences totalling 11-1/2 years in a penal colony on charges including fraud which he says were trumped up to prevent him from challenging Putin, an idea the Kremlin rejects.
Actor Benedict Cumberbatch, filmmaker JJ Abrams, former footballer Eric Cantona, and many others have signed an open letter to Vladimir Putin demanding the release of Alexey Navalny.
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Read the letter here:https://t.co/7fYRqoKubl
— Novaya Gazeta Europe (@novayagazeta_en) April 28, 2023
Russian authorities claim that Navalny has ties with the US CIA intelligence agency and that his supporters are extremists.
The signatories, which included actors Jude Law and Benedict Cumberbatch, and writers Margaret Atwood, JK Rowling and Salman Rushdie, said in a letter, “He has been consistently returned to solitary confinement, (and) squeezed into a concrete cell the size of a dog kennel, with no ventilation.”
“Visits from relatives and phone calls are forbidden, his attorney-client privileges have been cancelled. Despite running a fever, he is required to stand all day,” they added.
They added that they have extended their support to those doctors who had requested immediate medical attention for Navalny and to those of Russian lawyers and regional deputies demanding an end to what they called Navalny’s “torture.”
Navalny earned admiration from Russia’s disparate opposition for voluntarily returning to Russia in 2021 from Germany, where he had been treated for what Western laboratory tests showed was an attempt to poison him with a nerve agent in Siberia.
With inputs from agencies
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