Yulia Navalnaya, the widow of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, has called for Russians to attend an election day demonstration at noon on March 17 and vote against President Vladimir Putin, or dirty their ballots.
Navalnaya said in a YouTube video that she had drawn hope from the large crowds that attended her husband’s burial last week, who died in an Arctic penal camp on February 16 and whose grave had now been submerged in a sea of flowers.
She asked people to join the March 17 action that Navalny, Russia’s most well-known opposition member, had called for soon before his death. His concept was that individuals may register a protest without the fear of detention by merely showing up en-masse at the same time on election day in cities across the country.
“We need to use the election day to show that we exist and there are many of us. We are real, living people, and we are against Putin. You need to come to the voting station on the same day and at the same time on March 17 at noon,” Yulia Navalnaya said.
Meanwhile, since her husband’s death, Navalnaya has promised to continue his work and made several high-profile political appearances in the West, including meeting US President Joe Biden and addressing the Munich Security Conference and the European Parliament.
The Kremlin has strongly denied accusations by Navalnaya that Putin had Navalny killed and has declined to comment on the public response to his death and funeral. His death certificate said he died of natural causes at the age of 47.
