Russia’s most famous opponent, Alexei Navalny, was sentenced to nine years in prison on Tuesday for “fraud” and “contempt of court”, noted AFP journalists present at the hearing.
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Judge Margarita Kotova added to this sentence a year and a half of probation and a fine of 1.2 million rubles, or around 10,000 euros at the daily rate, while the Kremlin critic has already been imprisoned for more than ‘a year.
He will have to serve his sentence in a “severe regime penal colony”, which means that his conditions of detention will become stricter.
The charismatic anti-corruption activist and former lawyer, 45, had been on trial since mid-February behind the walls of his penal colony, 100 km east of Moscow, in an improvised court.
Mr Navalny was accused of embezzling millions of rubles in donations to his anti-corruption organizations and of “contempt of court” during a previous trial.
