Yulia Navalnaya wrote her ‘murdered’ husband’s identify on her poll
- People the world over solid their vote within the remaining day of the Russian election
Yulia Navalnaya claimed she wrote the identify of her ‘murdered’ husband on her poll whereas voting within the Russian presidential in election in Berlin this afternoon.
The widow of Vladimir Putin‘s opposition chief Alexei Navalny voted within the German capital as 1000’s heeded her name to stage ‘midday in opposition to Putin’ and protest at embassies world wide.
Speaking to reporters after her vote she mentioned: ‘Obviously I wrote Navalny’s identify. It cannot be {that a} month earlier than a presidential marketing campaign, a month earlier than an election, Putin’s foremost opponent, who was already in jail, was killed’.
Asked whether or not she had a message for Putin, Navalnaya replied: ‘Please cease asking for messages from me or from anyone for Mr. Putin. There may very well be no negotiations and nothing with Mr. Putin, as a result of he is a killer, he is a gangster.’
Her husband died final month whereas in an Arctic penal colony after he was barred from standing on this election, in addition to the vote that happened six years in the past.
Yulia Navalnaya, widow of the late Russian dissident Alexei Navalny, addresses the media after casting her poll within the Russian presidential elections on the Russian embassy in Berlin
Navalnaya walks down the steps after casting her poll within the Russian presidential elections contained in the Russian embassy in Berlin, Germany
Navalnaya seen together with her supporters in Berlin on the ultimate day of the presidential election in Russia
Supporters chanted ‘Yulia, we’re with you’ as she entered the embassy to solid her poll this afternoon and she or he thanked her fellow Russians for queuing so lengthy.
Voting happened over three days at polling stations throughout the huge nation’s 11 time zones, in illegally annexed areas of Ukraine and on-line.
Thousands throughout the nation who oppose the veteran Kremlin chief went to their native polling station at noon to both spoil their poll paper in protest or to vote for one of many three candidates standing in opposition to Putin.
Others vowed to scrawl the identify of late opposition chief Alexei Navalny, who died final month in an Arctic jail, on their poll paper.
Navalny had endorsed the ‘Noon in opposition to Putin’ plan in a message on social media facilitated by his legal professionals earlier than he died. The impartial Novaya Gazeta newspaper referred to as the deliberate motion ‘Navalny’s political testomony’.
His allies broadcast movies on YouTube of strains of individuals queuing up at completely different polling stations throughout Russia at noon who they mentioned had been there to peacefully protest.
‘There could be very little hope but when you are able to do one thing (like this) it is best to do it. There is nothing left of democracy,’ one younger lady, who didn’t give her identify and whose face was blurred out by Navalny’s group, mentioned at one polling station.
Another younger lady at a distinct polling station, whose id had been disguised in the identical means, mentioned she had voted for the ‘least doubtful’ of the three candidates operating in opposition to Putin.
A detailed-up of a stylised ‘demise head’ poster of Russian president Vladimir Putin on the facade of the Museum of Medical History in entrance of the Russian embassy in Riga, Latvia
A Russian pro-democracy activist holds a flag studying ‘Putin is just not Russia’ outdoors a polling station within the Russian college in Belgrade, Serbia
A male pupil voting in Moscow instructed Navalny’s channel that individuals like him who disagreed with the present system wanted to go on residing their lives regardless.
‘History has proven that adjustments happen on the most surprising of instances,’ he mentioned.
Navalny had endorsed the ‘Noon in opposition to Putin’ plan in a message on social media facilitated by his legal professionals earlier than he died. The impartial Novaya Gazeta newspaper referred to as the deliberate motion ‘Navalny’s political testomony’.
The protesters, nevertheless, solely symbolize a small fraction of Russia’s 114 million voters resulting in Putin to tighten his grip on energy within the election that’s sure to ship him a giant victory.
The Kremlin casts Navalny’s political allies – most of whom are based mostly outdoors Russia – as harmful extremists out to destabilise the nation on behalf of the West.
Despite tight controls, a number of dozen instances of vandalism at polling stations had been reported throughout the voting interval.
Several individuals had been arrested, together with in Moscow and St. Petersburg, after they tried to start out fires or set off explosives at polling stations whereas others had been detained for throwing inexperienced antiseptic or ink into poll packing containers.
While polls closed Sunday night time in Russia, voting continued at some embassies world wide. In the UK, lengthy queues of individuals lined up outdoors the Russian Embassy in London to solid their votes.
Crowds of supporters wait outdoors the Russian embassy in Berlin as Navalnaya casts her vote
Alexei Navalny (pictured along with his spouse in 2013) died final month whereas in an Arctic penal colony after he was barred from standing on this election
Russia’s overseas ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova questioned if all these voting at overseas embassies had been opponents of Putin and accused Western media of disseminating propaganda concerning the occasions.
‘Russian residents didn’t come to the rallies and performances that unfriendly regimes and their paid info providers are attempting to current,’ Zakharova mentioned.
‘They got here to solid their vote. Who they voted for and the way they voted is their free alternative. But the truth that they rejected the appeals of the marginalised is clear to everybody.’
Russian officers launched early returns Sunday exhibiting President Vladimir Putin has almost 88 per cent of the vote in an election the place he stifled the opposition.
The vote, which holds little suspense, is going down in opposition to the backdrop of the harshest crackdown on political opposition and freedom of speech in Russia since Soviet instances.
Only three token candidates – and nobody who opposes his warfare in Ukraine – had been allowed to run in opposition to him as he sought a fifth time period.
