MOSCOW: A Moscow court is expected Wednesday to outlaw the organizations founded by Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny — part of authorities’ efforts to muzzle critics ahead of a crucial parliamentary election in September.
Prosecutors have asked the Moscow City Court to designate Navalny’s Foundation for Fighting Corruption and his sprawling network of regional offices across Russia as extremist organizations. In conjunction with a new law, the ruling would bar people associated with the groups from running for public office, derailing the hopes of Navalny’s allies of seeking parliamentary seats.
The extremism label would also mean that activists who have worked with the organizations, anyone who donated to them, and even those who simply shared the groups’ materials could be prosecuted and receive lengthy prison terms.
Navalny, the most adamant political foe of president Vladimir Putin, was arrested in January upon returning from Germany, where he spent five months convalescing after a nerve agent poisoning that he blames on the Kremlin — accusations that Russian officials reject. In February, Navalny was given a 2 1/2-year prison term for violating the terms of a suspended sentence from a 2014 embezzlement conviction that he dismissed as politically driven.
The court hearing on his organizations was held behind closed doors on the grounds that classified materials would be discussed.
Ivan Pavlov, who heads a team of defense lawyers in the case, said the court is expected to issue its verdict Wednesday. The judge has rejected a defense appeal to allow Navalny to take part in the hearings via a video link from prison and dismissed other motions by the defense.
“There is no talk about the equal representation of the parties in the case,” he said.
Navalny’s offices in dozens of Russian regions already shut down in April after the prosecutors issued an injunction to suspend their activities pending the court’s ruling, but the opposition leader’s associates have vowed to continue their work in different formats.
His foundation, started 10 years ago, has relentlessly targeted senior government officials with colorful and widely watched videos that detail corruption allegations against them. One of its latest productions, which has received 117 million views on YouTube, claimed that a lavish palace on the shores of the Black Sea was built for Putin through an elaborate corruption scheme. The Kremlin has denied any links to Putin.
Navalny also has relied on his offices across Russia to organize anti-Kremlin protests and implement his Smart Voting strategy — a project to support the candidates most likely to defeat those from the Kremlin’s dominant United Russia party in various elections.
During Wednesday’s hearing, prosecutors accused Navalny’s organizations of staging protests to overthrow the government.
Just as the Moscow court was considering the prosecutors’ request to outlaw Navalny’s organizations, Russian lawmakers have fast-tracked a new law that banned members of organizations declared extremist from running for public office. The law was signed by Putin last week — and combined with the expected court ruling will dash the hopes of several of Navalny’s associates who have declared their intention to run for the Russian parliament in the Sept. 19 election.
Ivan Zhdanov, a top Navalny associate who headed his foundation, said the court was waiting for the law to take effect to tag Navalny’s organizations as extremist. He vowed that the team will continue publishing exposes of corrupt officials and apply the Smart Voting strategy.
“Navalny’s team will not stop its activities, they shouldn’t hope for that,” Zhdanov, who lives abroad, told the independent Dozhd TV.
The September vote is widely seen as an important part of Putin’s efforts to cement his rule ahead of the 2024 Russian presidential election. The 68-year-old leader, who has been in power for more than two decades, pushed through constitutional changes last year that would potentially allow him to hold onto power until 2036.
The crackdown on Navalny and his associates is just one part of a multi-pronged government strategy to steamroll the opposition ahead of the vote. Last week, authorities also arrested Andrei Pivovarov, the head of another anti-Kremlin group that they have labeled “undesirable” — a designation used by the Kremlin to outlaw more than 30 groups.
Days before his arrest, Pivovarov announced the dissolution of his Open Russia movement to protect members from prosecution, but that didn’t stop authorities from pulling him off a Warsaw-bound plane at St. Petersburg’s airport last week. A court in southern Russia’s Krasnodar region ordered him to be held for two months pending an investigation.
Membership in “undesirable” organizations is a criminal offense under a 2015 law, and another bill now making its way through the Russian parliament increases the punishment for it, introducing prison terms of up to six years for their members.
Open Russia was financed by Russian tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who moved to London after spending 10 years in prison in Russia on charges widely seen as political revenge for challenging Putin’s rule. Khodorkovsky has described the ongoing crackdown on dissent as a reflection of authorities’ concern about the waning popularity of the main Kremlin-directed party, United Russia.
Another opposition activist, Dmitry Gudkov, a former Russian lawmaker who has aspired to run again for the parliament, was held for two days last week on financial charges that he and his supporters allege were trumped up. He went abroad after being released, saying that he had received a warning that he would be jailed if he didn’t leave the country.
Russia expected to outlaw opposition leader Navalny’s groups
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Russia expected to outlaw opposition leader Navalny’s groups
- Navalny, the most adamant political foe of president Vladimir Putin, was arrested in January upon returning from Germany
- Prosecutors accused Navalny’s organizations of staging protests to overthrow the government
UN Security Council demands pullout of Rwanda-backed armed group from DR Congo
- UN Security Council condemns ‘flagrant disregard’ for sovereignty in DR Congo
- Congo late Saturday broke off relations with Rwanda, which has denied backing the M23 despite evidence collected by UN experts and others
- US, France tells Rwanda to back off, warning that the US would hold accountable those responsible for sustaining the armed conflict
UNITED NATIONS/GOMA, Congo: The UN Security Council on Sunday denounced the “flagrant disregard” for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), demanding the withdrawal of “external forces” without explicitly naming them.
The Council “condemned the ongoing flagrant disregard for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the DRC, including the unauthorized presence in the Eastern DRC of external forces as reported by the Group of Experts and demanded that these forces withdraw immediately,” it said in a statement Sunday evening, referencing a UN expert report that criticized the presence of Rwandan forces and their support for the M23 armed group fighting the Congolese army.
During an emergency meeting of the Security Council, UN‘s special representative for Congo said the attacking forces has caused “mass panic” in eastern Congo’s largest city, Goma, a humanitarian and security hub and home to 2 million people.
“M23 has declared the airspace over Goma closed,” UN special representative, Bintou Keita said. “In other words, we are trapped.”
Keita said M23 fighters were using residents “as human shields” as they advanced, while others fled for their lives.
The M23 rebels’ offensive at the heart of the mineral-rich region threatens to dramatically worsen one of Africa’s longest wars and create further misery for what is already one of the world’s largest humanitarian crises, with millions of people displaced.
‘Declaration of war’
Congo late Saturday broke off relations with Rwanda, which has denied backing the M23 despite evidence collected by UN experts and others. Congo’s government called it a “declaration of war.”
The surge of violence has killed at least 13 peacekeepers over the past week. And Congolese were again on the run.
The M23 has made significant territorial gains along Congo’s border with Rwanda in recent weeks, after months of regional attempts to make peace failed. On Sunday night, the rebels called on Congo’s army to surrender their arms and present themselves at a local stadium by 3 a.m. or they would take the city.
The Uruguayan army, who are in Goma serving with the UN peacekeeping mission, said in a statement on X late Sunday that some Congolese soldiers have laid down their weapons.
“More than a hundred FARDC soldiers are sheltered in the facilities of the “Siempre Presente” base awaiting the (Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration) process,” the statement said.
In photos shared with the statement, armed men are seen registering with the peacekeepers in a mix of military uniforms and civilian clothing.
Congo’s foreign minister, Thérèse Kayikwamba Wagner, told the Security Council that Rwanda was committing “a frontal aggression, a declaration of war which no longer hides itself behind diplomatic maneuvers.”
Rwanda’s ambassador to the UN, Ernest Rwamucyo, did not confirm or deny Congo’s claims. He blamed Congo’s government, saying the crisis could have been been averted if it had “demonstrated a genuine commitment to peace.”
US and France weigh in
The United States and France called for a ceasefire and appealed to Rwanda to withdraw its support to M23, with acting US Ambassador Dorothy Shea warning that the US would “consider all the tools at its disposal” to hold accountable those responsible for sustaining the armed conflict.
In the past 48 hours, two UN peacekeepers from South Africa and one from Uruguay were killed and 11 others were injured and hospitalized, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’ spokesman said ahead of the Security Council meeting.
The UN chief reiterated his “strongest condemnation” of the M23 offensive “with the support of the Rwanda Defense Forces,” and called on the rebel group to immediately halt all hostile action and withdraw, spokesman Stephane Dujarric said.
Congo, the United States and UN experts accuse Rwanda of backing M23, which is mainly made up of ethnic Tutsis who broke away from the Congolese army more than a decade ago. It’s one of about 100 armed groups that have been vying for a foothold in the mineral-rich region, where a long-running conflict has created one of the world’s largest humanitarian crises.
Rwanda’s government denies backing the rebels, but last year acknowledged that it has troops and missile systems in eastern Congo to safeguard its security, pointing to a buildup of Congolese forces near the border. UN experts estimate up to 4,000 Rwandan forces are in Congo.
Congo’s foreign ministry said late Saturday it was severing diplomatic ties with Rwanda and pulling all diplomatic staff from the country “with immediate effect.”
Rwandan Foreign Minister Olivier Nduhungirehe told The Associated Press on Sunday that the decision to cut ties was a unilateral move by Congo.
“For us, we took appropriate measures to evacuate our remaining diplomat in Kinshasa, who was under permanent threat by Congolese officials,” Nduhungirehe said.
The M23 took Goma once before in 2012, withdrawing after considerable international pressure was put on Rwanda.
Civilians flee the rebel advance
On Sunday morning, heavy gunfire resonated across Goma, a few kilometers (miles) from the front line. Scores of children and adults fled the Kanyaruchinya camp, one of the largest in eastern Congo for displaced people, near the Rwandan border.
“We are fleeing because we saw soldiers on the border with Rwanda throwing bombs and shooting,” said Safi Shangwe, who was heading into the city.
Some of the displaced worried they would not be safe in Goma, either. “I heard that there are bombs in Goma, too, so now we don’t know where to go,” said Adèle Shimiye.
Hundreds of people attempted to flee to Rwanda. Migration officers at a border crossing east of Goma carefully checked travel documents.
“I am crossing to the other side to see if we will have a place of refuge because for the moment, security in the city is not guaranteed,” Goma resident Muahadi Amani told the AP.
UN deputy humanitarian chief Joyce Msuya said the situation was rapidly deteriorating. “If hostilities spill into Goma – a densely populated urban center – the impact on civilians could be devastating,” she said.
Congo’s army has said it was fending off the M23 offensive with the help of allied forces, including UN peacekeepers and soldiers from the Southern African Development Community Mission, also known as SAMIDRC.
In addition to the two South African peacekeepers, seven South African troops with SAMIDIRC have been killed in recent days, South Africa’s defense ministry said.
Since 2021, Congo’s government and allied forces — including the 14,000-strong UN mission — have been keeping M23 away from Goma.
Goma resident Bahati Jackson’s family has been hearing gunfire and remembers fleeing M23’s seizure of the city in 2012. But this time, they’re staying.
“If we’re going to die, it’s better to die here,” Jackson said.
Lukashenko pockets massive win in Belarus election scorned by the West
- Alexander Lukashenko took 86.8 percent of the vote in Sunday’s election
- European politicians have said the vote was neither free nor fair
“You can congratulate the Republic of Belarus, we have elected a president,” the head of the country’s Central Election Commission of the Republic Igor Karpenko told a press conference in the early hours of Monday, according to Russian state media.
According to results published on the Central Election Commission’s Telegram account, Lukashenko took 86.8 percent of the vote in Sunday’s election.
European politicians said the vote was neither free nor fair because independent media are banned in the former Soviet state and all leading opposition figures have been sent to penal colonies or forced to flee abroad.
“The people of Belarus had no choice. It is a bitter day for all those who long for freedom & democracy,” German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock posted on X.
Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski expressed mock surprise that “only” 87.6 percent of the electorate appeared to have backed Lukashenko.
“Will the rest fit inside the prisons?” he wrote on X.
Asked about the jailing of his opponents, Lukashenko said they had “chosen” their fate.
“Some chose prison, some chose ‘exile’, as you say. We didn’t kick anyone out of the country,” he told a rambling press conference on Sunday that lasted more than four hours and 20 minutes.
The close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin had earlier defended his jailing of dissidents and declared: “I don’t give a damn about the West.”
Elon Musk says $1 million election giveaway wasn’t an illegal lottery
- Arizona resident Jacqueline McAferty claimed that Musk and his political action committee America PAC falsely induced voters in seven battleground states to sign the petition by promising that winners would be chosen randomly
WASHINGTON: Elon Musk asked a federal judge to dismiss a proposed class action by voters who said the world’s richest person defrauded them into signing a petition to support the US Constitution for a chance to win his $1 million-a-day giveaway.
In a late Friday filing in the Austin, Texas federal court, Musk rejected the claim the giveaway was an illegal “lottery” that violated a Texas law against deceptive trade practices.
Arizona resident Jacqueline McAferty claimed that Musk and his political action committee America PAC falsely induced voters in seven battleground states to sign the petition by promising that winners would be chosen randomly.
Musk founded America PAC to support Republican Donald Trump’s successful 2024 presidential run.
According to Musk, however, voters were told they would be reviewed for an opportunity to earn the $1 million by becoming America PAC spokespeople.
This, Musk said, defeated any notion that the money was a “prize” to be won.
“Make no mistake: an eligible voter’s opportunity to earn is not the same thing as a chance to win,” Musk said.
Chance, he added, “was not involved here.”
Musk also rejected the suggestion that petition signers suffered harm by providing their names, addresses and phone numbers, which they said Musk and America PAC could then sell.
Lawyers for the proposed class did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Sunday.
The lawsuit was filed on Election Day, Nov. 5, 2024.
A day earlier, a Philadelphia judge refused to end Musk’s giveaway, saying that city’s top prosecutor also failed to show it was an illegal lottery.
McAferty’s lawsuit seeks at least $5 million in damages for everyone who signed the petition.
Musk is a Texas resident and his electric car company Tesla is based in Austin.
The case is McAferty v Musk et al, US District Court, Western District of Texas, No. 24-01346.
Zelensky again replaces commander of Ukraine’s key eastern front
- Russian forces have been steadily advancing in eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk region toward Pokrovsk, bypassing it from the south and trying to cut off supply routes to Ukraine’s troops
MELBOURNE: President Volodymyr Zelensky on Sunday replaced for the third time in under a year the commander of a key Ukrainian military formation responsible for defending the eastern hub of Pokrovsk that’s under increased risk of falling to Russian forces.
Zelensky, in his nightly video address, said he put Ukraine’s new commander of ground forces, Major General Mykhailo Drapatyi, in charge of the Khortytsia operational-strategic group, whose area of responsibility includes much of Ukraine’s eastern front.
“These are the toughest areas of fighting,” Zelensky said, adding that he had discussed the changes at meeting with Ukraine’s Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi.
Russia’s capture of the city would bring it closer to seizing the entire Donetsk region, which has been one of President Vladimir Putin’s key goals in his war in Ukraine.
Zelensky added that Drapatyi’s appointment will help to combine the combat work of the army with the proper training of brigades.
“It is the front-line needs that should determine the standards for staffing and training of brigades,” he said.
Drapatyi will replace Major General Andriy Hnatov, who has been in charge of Khortytsia since June and who will become a Deputy Chief of the General Staff to run training and communication.
Russian forces have been steadily advancing in eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk region toward Pokrovsk, bypassing it from the south and trying to cut off supply routes to Ukraine’s troops.
Pokrovsk, which had a pre-war population of around 60,000, has been one of Ukraine’s main defensive strongholds in the Donetsk region and the focus of fierce fighting for months.
Colombia caves on deportations after Trump tariff threats
- Colombia is the second Latin American nation to refuse US military deportation flights
WASHINGTON: Colombia on Sunday backed down and agreed to accept deported citizens sent on US military aircraft, hours after President Donald Trump threatened painful tariffs to punish the defiance to his mass deportation plans.
Colombia’s leftist president, Gustavo Petro, had earlier said he would only take back citizens “with dignity,” such as on civilian planes, and had turned back two US military aircraft with repatriated Colombians.
Trump, less than a week back in office, responded furiously and threatened sanctions of 25 percent that would quickly scale up to 50 percent against Latin America’s fourth largest economy.
Petro initially sought to hit back and impose his own tariffs on US products, but by the end of the volatile Sunday he had backed down.
Colombian Foreign Minister Luis Gilberto Murillo told a late-night news conference that his country had “overcome the impasse” and would accept returned citizens.
A White House statement said that Colombia has agreed to “unrestricted acceptance of all illegal aliens from Colombia returned from the United States, including on US military aircraft, without limitation or delay.”
“Today’s events make clear to the world that America is respected again,” it said.
“President Trump will continue to fiercely protect our nation’s sovereignty, and he expects all other nations of the world to fully cooperate in accepting the deportation of their citizens illegally present in the United States.”
Trump said he would suspend implementation of the tariffs.
It had been unclear even earlier how quickly Trump could impose tariffs on Colombia, historically one of Washington’s closest allies in Latin America, which enjoys a free-trade agreement with the United States.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio, whose wife is Colombian-American, suspended issuance of visas at the US embassy in Bogota and said visas would be revoked to Colombian government officials and their immediate family members.
The White House said the visa measures would stay in place until the first planeload of deportees returns.
Trump also vowed to subject Colombians to greater scrutiny at US airports.
Trump – who during his campaign said that immigrants were “poisoning the blood” of the United States – took office with promises to round up and swiftly deport undocumented people.
While some countries including Guatemala have accepted military deportation flights, Trump had faced resistance from Petro, a former guerrilla elected in 2022 as Colombia’s first left-wing leader.
“The United States cannot treat Colombian migrants as criminals. I forbid entry to our territory to US planes carrying Colombian migrants,” Petro wrote earlier on X.
The Colombian government earlier said it was instead ready to send its presidential plane to the United States to transport the migrants “with dignity.”
Petro also said there were 15,600 undocumented Americans living in his country and asked them to “regularize their situation,” while ruling out raids to arrest and deport them.
Petro’s initial hard-ball tactics infuriated his many critics in the historic US ally.
Former right-wing president Ivan Duque accused Petro of “an act of tremendous irresponsibility” for refusing what he called Colombia’s “moral duty” to take back illegal migrants and warned US sanctions would take an “enormous” toll.
Trump’s deportation threats have put him on a potential collision course with governments in Latin America, the original home of most of the United States’ estimated 11 million undocumented migrants.
Brazil, which is also led by a left-wing president, voiced outrage over treatment by the Trump administration of dozens of Brazilian migrants deported back to their country on Friday.
The migrants, who were deported under a bilateral agreement predating Trump’s return, were handcuffed on the flight, in what Brazil called “flagrant disregard” for their basic rights.
Edgar Da Silva Moura, a 31-year-old computer technician who was among the 88 deported migrants, said: “On the plane they didn’t give us water, we were tied hands and feet, they wouldn’t even let us go to the bathroom.”
“It was very hot, some people fainted.”
The president of Honduras, Xiomara Castro, called for an urgent meeting of leaders from the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) to take place Thursday in Tegucigalpa to discuss migration following the latest US moves.
While previous US administrations also routinely carried out deportations, the Trump administration has begun using military aircraft, with at least one landing in Guatemala this week.
