Alexei Navalny’s ‘bruised body seen in morgue’ as mother ‘blocked’ – live

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European Union countries are expected to seek new sanctions against Moscow over the death last week of Alexei Navalny, Russia’s most prominent opposition leader, said the chairman of the bloc’s foreign ministers’ talks on Monday.

“We have to send a message of support to Russian opposition… So on both fronts, the political one and the military one, we have to continue our support to Ukraine and to the Russian people who want to be living in freedom,” said the EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell.

He added that the bloc is proposing to rename its human rights sanction regime in the name of the jailed Vladimir Putin critic.

Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya, is joining the foreign ministers’ gathering in Brussels on Monday.

Lithuania’s foreign minister Gabrielius Landsbergis said on Monday the EU needs to “at least sharpen” sanctions against Russia after Alexei Navalny’s death, while “half-measures” are not enough to stop Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“If Ukraine falls, everybody is very clear to understand: we will be next. Putin has no intention to stop, he wouldn’t be able to stop,” Landsbergis said ahead of a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Brussels, where they will be joined by the widow of Navalny.

Navalny, Putin’s most formidable domestic opponent, died on Friday at the “Polar Wolf” Arctic penal colony where he was serving a three-decade sentence.

In early December last year, Navalny disappeared from a central Russian prison where he was serving a two-decade sentence on extremism and fraud charges, that supporters and the international community say are trumped up. It then emerged three weeks later that he had been transferred to the IK-3 prison camp in Kharp, about 1,900km (1,200 miles) northeast of Moscow, where temperatures reach up to -30C.

Alexander Butler reports:

The Government is currently weighing up its response to the death of the jailed opposition leader, as Western capitals heaped blame on Vladimir Putin.

Foreign Secretary Lord Cameron has already signalled that there could be fresh sanctions against Russia officials, amid questions for the Russian authorities over how exactly Mr Navalny died.

Alexei Navalny’s bruised body has allegedly been seen in a morgue.

An independent Russian newspaper cited an anonymous source claiming that the body of the Vladimir Putin critic had been delivered to a morgue at the Salekhard District Clinical Hospital.

The unnamed source, identified as an experienced paramedic, told Novaya Gazeta Europe on Sunday that his body was bruised and had been transported from the nearby town of Labytnangi.

The director of the Oscar-winning documentary on Alexei Navalny has said he is grateful to the late Russian opposition leader for his final message to the world to “safeguard and install democracy”.

Navalny director Daniel Roher became close to his subject and his family when he interviewed the democracy champion before he was sent to prison in January 2021. Roher kept in contact until Navalny’s death in a Russian penal colony, reported on Friday.

The Canadian documentary filmmaker told the PA news agency that he was “delighted and not surprised” that Navalny’s wife Yulia Navalnaya had addressed world leaders in Germany, just hours after her husband’s death was announced.

Charlotte McLaughlin reports:

Russian investigators have not yet established the cause of Alexei Navalny’s death and it is unclear how long it will take for official conclusions to be made, his mother was told, Navalny’s spokeswoman said on Monday.

Navalny, a 47-year-old former lawyer, fell unconscious and died on Friday after a walk at the “Polar Wolf” penal colony in Kharp, about 1,900 km (1,200 miles) northeast of Moscow, where he was serving a three-decade sentence, the prison service said.

Navalny’s mother, Lyudmila, was told on Saturday at the prison colony that he had perished from “sudden death syndrome”, a vague term for different hearth conditions that end in death, according to Navalny’s team.

Navalny’s spokeswoman, Kira Yarmysh, said that his 69-year-old mother, and lawyers were told that the official verification of the cause of death had been extended and that it was unclear how long it would take.

“The cause of death is ‘undetermined’,” Yarmysh said, adding that the Russian authorities were lying and stalling.

His mother and lawyers were not allowed into the morgue on Monday in the Arctic town near the prison colony where the authorities said he dropped dead, Yarmysh said.

“Asked if Alexei’s body was there, the staff did not answer,” said Yarmysh.