MOSCOW: A court in Russia on Tuesday added two more years to a seven and a half year jail sentence of a former associate of late opposition leader Alexei Navalny.
The latest development shows the Kremlin’s yearslong crackdown on dissent.
Lilia Chanysheva, who used to lead Navalny’s office in Bashkortostan region, was convicted on extremism charges, and Bashkortostan’s Supreme Court extended her imprisonment to a total of 9 1/2 years, her lawyer Ramil Gizatullin said in a post on social media app Telegram.
The case was heard behind closed doors.
Moscow’s crackdown against opposition members, independent journalists and government critics has increased after Russia sent forces into Ukraine two years ago.
Hundreds are facing criminal charges over demonstrations and condemning the war in Ukraine, while thousands have been briefly jailed or fined.
Chanysheva was sentenced for extremism, establishing an extremist group and founding an organization that violates rights last year. The charges against Chanysheva, who was taken into custody in November 2021, stem from a coed Navalny’s Foundation as extremist organizations.
Navalny died in an isolated Arctic prison in February this year. He was Russia’s best-known opposition leader and staunch critic of Putin’s policies. Navalny had been in jail since January 2021 and was serving a 19-year jail term on charges of extremism widely seen by the west as politically motivated.
Opposition leaders and Western leaders blamed the Kremlin for his death, which officials in Moscow have strongly rejected.
Kira Yarmysh, who had been Navalny’s spokeswoman, termed extension in Chanysheva’s sentence as horror.
In a post on x, formerly Twitter, he said Russian authorities had jailed a brave, honest woman because she fought for the future of Russia. He compared authorities in Russia with monsters.
