Amnesty International stripped Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny of his “prisoner of conscience” status in response to past comments, saying he “advocated violence and discrimination and he has not retracted such statements.”
The group confirmed Wednesday that it received enough complaints to warrant action against the Vladimir Putin critic, who, months ago, survived an assassination attempt by poisoning and is now in prison for charges in Russia that Navalny claims are politically motivated.
“Amnesty International is no longer able to consider Aleksei Navalny a prisoner of conscience given the fact that he advocated violence and discrimination and he has not retracted such statements,” the organization wrote in a statement.
New: @AmnestyUK withdraws designation of Navalny as a “prisoner of conscience.” In email, Amnesty says it’s “no longer able to consider Aleksei Navalny a prisoner of conscience given the fact that he advocated violence and discrimination and he has not retracted such statements.” pic.twitter.com/E9m0e6lzT8
— Aaron Maté (@aaronjmate) February 23, 2021
“We had too many requests; we couldn’t ignore them,” Amnesty International spokesman Alexander Artemev said.
The comments were originally discounted by the group as “not relevant,” he said, adding that he thought the complaints were part of an “orchestrated campaign” from “so-called concerned citizens” to discredit Navalny and “impede” the group’s calls for his release.
After Navalny was poisoned with a Soviet-era nerve agent in August 2020, in what many believe to be an attack by the Russian government, Navalny was sentenced on Feb. 2 to more than two years in prison for failing to meet the terms of his parole for a 2014 suspended sentence for embezzlement. Navalny was also charged under a libel law, facing accusations he defamed a World War II veteran. The 44-year-old maintains his innocence in both cases.
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“He cannot be a prisoner of conscience: that is someone who never advocates hate or violence or uses hate speech,” Artemev said.
Some of the complaints quoted a Twitter thread from a journalist published in Russia Today.
i’m also an ivy-league educated jew, & as a bonus i also went to oxford. both are joyless imperialist organizations but the point is, none of that western education has made navalny more palatable to me. he’s a nationalist neoliberal who hates migrants, is backed by oligarchs https://t.co/lAzFfekphZ
— katya (@kazbek) February 17, 2021
The comments in question came, in particular, from two videos.
In one video, recorded 15 years ago, the activist appears to compare dark-skinned Caucus militants to cockroaches, adding that while they can be killed with a slipper, he recommends a pistol, according to the New York Times.
In another video, he said, “We have a right to be [ethnic] Russians in Russia. And we will defend this right,” according to the New Yorker.
While Navalny apparently has not apologized for these remarks, what is less clear is whether he still identifies with them.
Yevgenia Albats, a Russian journalist and friend of Navalny, said she persuaded him to attend the Russian March, a demonstration of Russian nationalists, with her, according to the New Yorker.
Albats, who is Jewish, wore a Star of David across her chest. “He took a lot of s— for walking with a k—,” she said.
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After three years of trying to engage participants in conversation, Albats said they gave up.
“My idea is that you have to communicate with nationalists and educate them,” Navalny said in a 2015 interview. “Many Russian nationalists have no clear ideology. What they have is a sense of general injustice to which they respond with aggression against people with a different skin color or eyes of a different shape. I think it’s extremely important to explain to them that beating up migrants is not the solution to the problem of illegal immigration; the solution is a return to competitive elections that would allow us to get rid of the thieves and crooks who are getting rich off of illegal immigration.”
