Return Navalny's body to his family, famous Russians urge the authorities

Russians including Nobel Prize-winning journalist Dmitry Muratov and ballet star Mikhail Baryshnikov have released videos calling on Russian authorities to return the body of opposition leader Alexei Navalny to his family, a week after his death in an Arctic penal colony.

Navalny's mother said Thursday that she has seen her son’s body and that she is resisting heavy pressure to agree to a secret burial away from the public eye.

Lyudmila Navalnaya said investigators allowed her to see her son’s body in the city morgue. She said she repeated her demand to have Navalny’s body returned to her and protested what she described as authorities trying to force her to agree to a secret burial.

“They are blackmailing me. They are setting conditions where, when and how my son should be buried,” she said Thursday in a video statement from the Arctic city of Salekhard. “They want it to do it secretly without a mourning ceremony.”

Navalny’s spokesman, Kira Yarmysh said on X, formerly Twitter, that his mother was also shown a medical certificate stating that the 47-year-old politician died of “natural causes.” Yarmysh didn’t specify what those were.

Posting on social media, prominent Russians directly appealed to President Vladimir Putin, demanding that he return Navalny's body to his family.

“Just give Lyudmila her son,” Muratov, the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize said, adding, “It’s awkward to talk about this in a country that still considers itself Christian.”

Nadya Tolokonnikova, who became widely known after spending nearly two years in prison for taking part in a 2012 protest with the band Pussy Riot inside Moscow’s Christ the Savior Cathedral, also released a video.

“We were imprisoned for allegedly trampling on traditional