Monday 18, March
Yulia Navalnaya present at Russian Embassy polling station in Berlin
The widow of the Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny was present at a polling station at Berlin’s Russian embassy on Sunday, according to reports from Tagesspiegel.
Navalnaya said she wrote the name of her late husband, who died in a prison camp in mid-February, on the ballot. Hundreds of people took part in a demonstration in front of the Russian embassy, many waving flags in white and blue, which represent the new colours of a free Russian, participants said.
According to police, around 2,000 people stood in line to vote at the embassy. Navalnaya, along with the Kremlin-critic and businessman Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who lives in exile in the UK, were present. Unsurprisingly, Vladimir Putin has been announced as the winner of Russia’s heavily-manipulated presidential elections, which ended yesterday.
Putin won 87% of the vote; the highest-ever election result in Russia’s post-Soviet history. At 71, he has overtaken Joseph Stalin as the country’s longest-serving leader in over 200 years.
