(12 Sep 2024)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
++PLEASE NOTE: AP IS OPERATING IN RUSSIA ACCORDING TO RUSSIAN RESTRICTIONS ON ALL REPORTING RELATED TO THE ONGOING MILITARY OPERATION IN UKRAINE++
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Petushki, Russia – 12 September 2024
1. Alexei Navalny’s lawyer Vadim Kobzev being led by police into cage in courtroom
2. Wide of courtroom
3. Various of Alexei Navalny’s lawyers Igor Sergunin, Alexei Liptser and Vadim Kobzev in cage, judge, court hearing
4. State prosecutor giving papers to judge
5. SOUNDBITE (Russian) Yulia Shilova, judge:
“A motion was received from state prosecutors to consider the criminal case against Kobzev, Liptser and Sergunin in a closed court session.”
6. Wide of courtroom UPSOUND (Russian) Yulia Shilova, judge:
“In order to ensure the safety in the interests of the participants in the court session (inaudible), the court ruled: to satisfy the motion of the state prosecutors. In accordance with paragraph 4 of part 1 of article (inaudible) of the Russian Criminal Code (inaudible), Kobzev, Liptser and Sergunin, accused of committing crimes according to (inaudible) of article 282 of the Russian Criminal Code. The hearing of the case is closed, I ask everyone who is not participating in the court session to leave the courtroom.”
7. Various of court exteriors
8. SOUNDBITE (Russian) Andrei Orlov, lawyer of Alexei Liptser:
“In our opinion, the closure of the trial is illegal and unfounded. The letter that was presented by the prosecutors in justification of the need to close the trial contained only assumptions about what could be, and was not supported by any objective data, therefore we consider this decision illegal.”
9. Pan of police walking past court building
STORYLINE:
Three lawyers who once represented the late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny went on trial Thursday in Russia, part of the Kremlin’s unrelenting crackdown on dissent that has in recent years reached levels unseen since the Soviet times.
Vadim Kobzev, Igor Sergunin and Alexei Liptser were arrested in October 2023 on charges of involvement with an extremist group. The case has been widely seen as a means to ramp up pressure on the Kremlin’s fiercest foe at the time and to discourage defense lawyers from taking on political cases.
When they were arrested, Navalny was already serving a 19-year prison term on several criminal convictions, including extremism. The extremism charges against the opposition politician stemmed from a 2021 court ruling that outlawed his organizations in Russia — the Foundation for Fighting Corruption and a vast network of regional offices — as extremist groups.
That ruling, which exposed anyone involved with the organizations to prosecution, was condemned by Kremlin critics as politically motivated and designed to stifle Navalny’s political activities.
According to Navalny’s allies, authorities accused the lawyers of using their status as defense attorneys to pass letters from the imprisoned politician to his team, effectively serving as intermediaries between Navalny and what they consider to be his “extremist group.”
Navalny, a 47-year-old anti-corruption campaigner and outspoken opponent of President Vladimir Putin, was arrested in January 2021 upon his return from Germany, where he was recuperating from a nerve agent poisoning he blamed on the Kremlin.
In February 2024, he suddenly died behind bars in what his team and his widow Yulia Navalnaya charged to be a murder ordered by the Kremlin. Officials have rejected the accusations.
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