“I want to live in a free Russia, I want to build a free Russia,” Navalnaya said in the video message titled “I will continue the work of Alexei Navalny”.
“I urge you to stand next to me,” she said. “I ask you to share the rage with me. Rage, anger, hatred towards those who dared to kill our future.”
It was unclear where she was speaking from but she was not in Russia. Navalnaya attended a meeting of European Union foreign ministers in Brussels on Monday which was considering imposing further sanctions on Russia over her husband’s death.
Russian authorities said the cause of Navalny’s death is still unknown – and the results of any investigation are likely to be questioned abroad.
Western countries have unanimously pointed blame at the Russian authorities for his death, three years into his sentence, which deprives the opposition of its most prominent figure a month ahead of presidential elections that are expected to enhance Putin’s firm grip on power.
“It is terrible that Alexei Navalny has paid the ultimate price for his fight for a free and democratic Russia,” Hanke Bruins Slot, the Netherlands’ foreign affairs minister, posted on X, formerly Twitter.
“This afternoon, I summoned the Russian ambassador to the ministry to demand clarification on his death,” she said late on Monday. “We strongly urge Russia to release Navalny’s body to his family and relatives.”
On Friday, Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares said Madrid “demands that the circumstances” of the death be clarified.
After Russian authorities announced Navalny’s death, his mother and lawyers had travelled to the Siberian penal colony where he was being held to retrieve the body but so far the authorities have not granted them access.
Authorities are not going to release Navalny’s body for another 14 days, according to Navalny’s spokeswoman Kira Yarmysh.
“The investigators told the lawyers and Alexei’s mother that they would not give them the body. The body will be under some sort of ‘chemical examination’ for another 14 days,” Yarmysh wrote on X, formerly Twitter, on Monday.
According to the prison authorities, Navalny dropped dead on Friday while walking around the courtyard of his prison camp in freezing temperatures. Attempts to resuscitate him failed.
Trump breaks silence on Navalny’s death, casts no blame on Putin
Trump breaks silence on Navalny’s death, casts no blame on Putin
Russia’s Civic Initiative party said it has applied to the Moscow city administration for a memorial march in honour of Navalny and Putin critic Boris Nemtsov, who was killed in a drive-by assassination in February 2015.
Andrey Nechayev, the head of the party and a former economy minister from 1992 to 1993, published a scan of the application on his Telegram channel on Monday.
The march would take place in the centre of Moscow on March 2, with up to 50,000 participants, according to the form.
However, it is unlikely that the Russian authorities will grant the application.
Civic Initiative, which is not represented in parliament, is considered a moderate opposition party.
For the presidential elections in March, the party had nominated liberal opposition figure and anti-war activist Boris Nadezhdin, however his candidacy was rejected by the Central Election Commission, citing a large number of incorrect signatures from supporters.
Demonstrations organised by the opposition have been banned for years in Russia. The authorities give different reasons, with coronavirus still being cited most often, a threat that does not seem to affect large-scale gatherings organised by the Kremlin.
Several Chechens were convicted of killing Nemtsov but those who planned the murder have still not been prosecuted, according to civil rights activists.
Additional reporting by dpa, Associated Press, Reuters