Sergey Navalny biography. Alexei Navalny - biography, information, personal life

Alexei Navalny was born near Moscow, in the small town of Butyn. He grew up in a complete family with his father Anatoly Navalny and mother Lyudmila Navalnaya. Anatoly was from the Chernobyl region, and here he received a military education. Alexey's mother was born in a small village near the city of Zelenogradsk. She received her education in this village and then worked in various factories.

In 1993, one of the factories where Lyudmila worked was ruined. Immediately, the parents decide to use this opportunity and create a workshop in this ruined factory. When Alexey finishes studying at school, he enters the Peoples' Friendship University at the Faculty of Law. In 1999, he entered the Financial Academy, which he successfully completed and received a diploma. While studying Alex He worked as a lawyer and later as an economist.

Activities as a politician

Alexei Navalny was a member of the political council of the Yabloko party from 2000 to 2007. Further, he often organized various popular movements and nationalist processions. Repeatedly created political organizations that protect the rights of people.

In 2008, Navalny, along with his like-minded people, began to organize an active struggle against oil companies, which, according to him, did not respond to numerous requests. In 2010 year Alexei Navalny founded the RosPil organization, which quickly found its like-minded people. Thanks to active and effective actions to prevent fraud, a large amount was saved for the state budget in a year. For this, the organization received an award at an international competition.

The Anti-Corruption Foundation is the only private organization in Russia investigating cases of this magnitude. An important issue for Russia is roads, with which the state is always in trouble, and to solve it, a project was founded that allows anyone to show a picture of a section of the road unsuitable for driving.

Complaints were sent to the traffic police, but the employees did not take action, so a paper was formed and sent to the prosecutor's office, which was necessary to provoke any work to fix the roads. It is also worth mentioning that Alexei Navalny discovered Shuvalov's private jet, on which his wife drove her dogs of high breeds to various exhibitions.

Candidate for mayor of Moscow

In 2013, Navalny was nominated for the post of mayor of the Russian capital. Initially, he was registered only because a larger selection of candidates for the post of mayor of Moscow was needed, but, contrary to all expectations, he fell slightly short of first place in the voting results.

Court cases

The next day, Aleksey collected a package of documents on the falsification of elections. During the demonstration, people actively expressed their dissatisfaction with the Moscow government. During the procession, the police detained Navalny, and Aleksey was arrested for 15 days, allegedly for resisting arrest. But the most important court case that unfolded around Navalny, was the case of "Kirovles" which dragged on for quite a long time.

The essence of this case lies in the fact that Alexei Navalny and the businessman, allegedly through delusion, made a deal with Opalev, the director of the enterprise described above, on unfavorable terms for him. Aleksey himself denied all guilt, referring to the fact that the case was fabricated due to the fact that Navalny had achieved his goal, and the director of the enterprise was removed from his post.

Subsequently, the case was closed, but a couple of months later it was reopened due to new data. As a result of the whole long chain of proceedings, the charge came into force. The politician explained this by the fact that the case was formed to protect him from political participation in the life of the country.

Family life

Navalny has a beautiful wife, Yulia, a daughter, Daria, and a son, Zakhar, who was born in 2008. For a long time, a large family lived in a one-room apartment, but the four of them became crowded, so they started looking for an apartment for rent.

Election 2018

The preparations for the elections went like this:

At the end of 2016, Alexey expressed his intention to participate in the 2018 presidential elections in the Russian Federation.
An election campaign was organized in which he announced his intention to continue the fight against corruption schemes.
In the spring and summer of 2017, Navalny again gathered strikes and rallies, as a result of which he was detained and received punishment, both in the form of a fine and in serving a sentence of 15 and 30 days.

On December 27, Navalny was not allowed to participate in the 2018 elections because of the Kirovles case, despite its illegality. After that, the politician called on his like-minded people to join the strike action.

Where is Navalny now and what is he doing? The arrest of an oppositionist for participating in a rally for 30 days did not surprise anyone - this happens almost after every protest action. Considering that Alexei Navalny is currently serving a suspended sentence in the Kirovles case, according to the Criminal Executive Code, the politician faces a real term for systematic violation of public order. However, the Russian authorities are in no hurry to put Navalny in jail.

There are several possible versions for this:

Navalny is a representative of the Kremlin's "pocket opposition";
The figure of Navalny is beneficial in the election campaign, since his candidacy will be removed due to a criminal case, and government officials may legally lose an important competitor;
They do not want to get involved with Navalny because of external pressure and the growth of protest moods.

The latter, however, can hardly be called a serious reason for refusing criminal prosecution, since the people in Russia did not react properly even to the murder of Boris Nemtsov. Moreover, Navalny's work with the people seems to be specifically aimed at depriving the opposition of its main activists. For example, even agreed-upon protests are moved to illegal venues, causing protesters to pay hefty fines by refusing to participate in subsequent events.

Therefore, the location of Navalny can be easily chosen from three options: work at the headquarters, a rally, an insulator. The politician actively travels around Russia, opens new headquarters, is engaged in information coverage of compromising evidence, after that he appoints a protest action, and safely sits in a monkey house.

Where does Alexey Navalny live?

Alexei Navalny lives with his family in Moscow, in the Maryino district, on Lyublinskaya street. In the most ordinary panel high-rise building. Navalny's three-room apartment in Moscow is an extremely modest option with laconic furnishings and a total area of 75 m2. The footage of searches in the house of the oppositionist was repeatedly broadcast by TV channels and YouTube, the declaration of income confirms the existence of this property.

Also, information flashed on the Internet that Navalny owns a house in France worth 3 million euros. However, the politician has not visited this country in recent years, and the news about overseas real estate has not been confirmed by anyone.

At the same time, according to the income statement, Navalny's wife owns a Ford Explorer SUV, and the politician himself was seen driving a luxury Infinity car.

What does Navalny do?

Alexei Navalny is engaged in political activities, and at the same time is a shareholder in a number of companies. Previously, the politician took part in the management of various corporations, including being a member of the board of directors of Aeroflot.

From a political point of view, Alexei Navalny has taken a win-win position by starting an active fight against corruption in the public sector. He founded the Anti-Corruption Foundation, made the films The Seagull and He Is Not Dimon to You, which received hundreds of millions of views on YouTube.

Despite pro-Western statements and accusations of links with the current government, Navalny's activities have found great support in Russia, especially among the younger generation. However, people of the older generation, who never received support from the state, also often go to opposition rallies.

At the same time, it cannot yet be said that Navalny's activities are capable of influencing the situation in Russia. Rallies continue to be held in unauthorized places, not a single lawsuit on their films has been won by politics.

Where Navalny is now and what he is doing in view of the extremely banal “film-illegal rally-prison” scheme is easy to predict.

A family

Parents of Alexei Navalny: father - Anatoly Ivanovich Navalny, co-owner and general director of the Kobyakovo wicker weaving factory, mother - Lyudmila Ivanovna Navalnaya, co-owner and commercial director of the Kobyakovo wicker weaving factory.

Wife - Yulia Borisovna Navalnaya, daughter Daria (born 2001), son Zakhar (born 2008).

Brother - Oleg Anatolyevich Navalny.

Biography

Alexei Navalny was born on June 4, 1976 in the military town of Butyn, Odintsovo District, Moscow Region.

In 1993, Navalny graduated from the Alabinsky secondary school in the military settlement of Kalininets. In the same year (according to other sources - in 1992) he moved to Moscow for permanent residence.

In 1993, Navalny entered the Faculty of Law Peoples' Friendship University of Russia. In 1998 he graduated from the Peoples' Friendship University of Russia, and in 1999 he entered the Faculty of Finance and Credit of the Financial Academy under the Government of the Russian Federation, from which he graduated in 2001.

Even while studying at PFUR, Navalny begins to gain work experience. For some time he worked in the legal department of the Aeroflot bank (until the bank's license was revoked in January 1997).

In 1997, Alexei Navalny enters the field of entrepreneurial activity.

In 1997 he registers LLC "Nesna" to organize hairdressing services, but the company was soon sold.

In 1997, Navalny registered Allekt LLC, in which until 2005 he served as deputy director for legal issues.

In 1998-1999, Navalny worked as a lawyer in the development company ST Group, owned by a businessman Shalva Chigirinsky(where he dealt with currency control and antitrust law), and then, according to media reports, he traded on the stock exchange and worked as a lawyer in various companies.

Alexei Navalny himself recalls the following about himself in the late 90s: " After jurisprudence, I graduated from "Securities and Exchange Business" at the Financial Academy. But there was a financial crisis, I lost what little money I had, and I never had to deal with it further. In addition, as it turned out, it was impossible to do this on the principle of "but I'm still a little trader", as a hobby, and I was not ready to devote myself to trading on the stock exchange".

In 2000, Navalny, together with fellow students at RUDN University, opened the company N.N. Securities, where he was the owner of 35% of the shares and held the post of chief accountant in it. "N. N. Securities" traded securities on the stock exchange, but the company went bankrupt.

In 2001, Navalny became a co-founder of the company "Eurasian transport systems"(Navalny's share is 34 percent of the shares), which specialized in logistics and road freight transportation.

In addition, Alexei Navalny participated in the family business of his parents: he owns 25% of the authorized capital of LLC "Kobyakovskaya basket weaving factory".

In 2006, Navalny worked as the host of the Urban Chronicles program at the radio station "Echo of Moscow".

In 2007, the firm "Allekt" was an agent of the party Union of Right Forces for advertising placement, and spent 99 million rubles through its accounts. According to official data, Navalny received a commission of 5% from the agreement with the Union of Right Forces, that is, approx. 5 million rubles. Subsequently, the firm "Allekt" was liquidated.

In 2008, Navalny founded "Union of Minority Shareholders", which, according to its own statement, should be engaged in protecting the rights of private investors. In the same year, Navalny bought shares in Rosneft, Gazprom, Lukoil, Surgutneftegaz, Gazprom Neft, Sberbank, and VTB for about 300,000 rubles.

Following the results of 2009, Alexei Navalny became the laureate of the fifth annual award of the Finance magazine in the nomination "For protecting the rights of minority shareholders".

In 2009, Navalny established LLC "Navalny and Partners" However, already in 2010 this company was liquidated.

In 2009, having become an adviser to the governor of the Kirov region, Alexei Navalny moved to the Kirov region for a while.

In 2009, Navalny passed the qualification exam at the Chamber of Advocates of the Kirov Region and in 2010 transferred to Moscow city bar association.

The profession of a lawyer did not become the main source of income for Alexei Navalny: in his entire legal practice, he participated in 11 cases in arbitration courts, and only in two of them personally, and in other cases his representatives spoke on his behalf.

In 2010, Alexei Navalny completed a six-month training at Yale University under the program "Yale World Fellows", on the recommendation, Evgeniya Albats, and Oleg Tsyvinsky.

In June 2012, Navalny joined the board of directors "Aeroflot" according to the decision of the annual meeting of shareholders. Navalny was included in the profile committees for personnel, remuneration and audit.

In February 2013, the media reported that Navalny was not nominated as a candidate for the new board of directors of Aeroflot.

On July 18, 2013, Alexei Navalny was sentenced under the so-called "case of Kirovles": 5 years in a general regime colony and a fine of 500 thousand rubles.

On October 16, 2013, the Kirov Regional Court changed the conviction, giving Navalny a suspended sentence. The verdict came into force.

Politics

The political career of Alexei Navalny began in 2000 when he joined the Yabloko party.

In 2002, Navalny was elected to the regional council of the Moscow branch of the party, and from April 2004 to February 2007, Navalny headed the apparatus of the Moscow regional branch of the Yabloko party.

During this period, Navalny began active political cooperation with a number of young liberals, for example, Nikita Belykh, Natalia Morari and .

In 2004, Navalny founded a citywide movement "Committee for the Protection of Muscovites" directed " against corruption and violation of the rights of citizens in the course of construction in Moscow".

In 2005, Navalny, together with Denis Terekhov was the founder "Foundation for the Support of Democratic Initiatives".

In 2005, together with Maria Gaidar, Natalya Morar and other liberals, Navalny participated in the creation of the Youth Movement "YES!", where he manages the project "Police with the people".

Since 2006, Navalny has been working as the coordinator of the Political Debates project and the chief editor of the TV version of the project called Fight Club. In several programs where Navalny took part, Maria Gaidar appeared, Eduard Bagirov, Maksim Kononenko, Julia Latynina, , , Maxim Martsinkevich and other public figures.

June 23, 2007 Alexei Navalny becomes one of the co-chairmen of the movement "People"(together with writers and Sergey Gulyaev). This political entity was of a national character, its ideology was declared as " democratic nationalism - the struggle for democracy and the rights of Russians".

A certain circle of supporters of the novice politician Navalny has formed in the People movement. For example, the published Manifesto of the movement was signed by the communist Peter Miloserdov, leader of the St. Petersburg branch of the NBP Andrey Dmitriev, editor-in-chief of Limonka Alexey Volynets, National Bolshevik writer Zakhar Prilepin, as well as Pavel Svyatenkov, Igor Romankov, Mikhail Dorozhkin and other persons.

A well-known political scientist appeared among the sponsors of the "People" movement Stanislav Belkovsky. As Navalny himself later recalled: " Belkovsky came up to me and said: here, you are doing everything right, well done, and somehow we became friends with him on this topic. He introduced me to many people.".

In December 2007, a meeting of the Bureau of the Yabloko party was held on the issue of expelling Navalny from the party. Navalny was expelled from the Yabloko party with the wording " for causing political damage to the party, in particular for nationalist activities".

In 2008, the media announced the creation of the "Russian National Movement", which included organizations DPNI(leader - Alexander Belov), "Great Russia"(leader - Andrey Saveliev) and "People". Alexei Navalny said that the new association will participate in the next elections to the State Duma, having a chance to win:

"I think such an association will receive a fairly large percentage of votes and will claim victory ... Up to 60 percent of the population adheres to spontaneous nationalism, but it is not politically formalized in any way".

Most of the public organizations established with the participation of Navalny were "disposable" structures that quickly ceased to exist for various reasons. The same fate befell the "Russian National Movement", which, according to Navalny himself, "organizationally did not take place."

In May 2008, Alexei Navalny announced that the companies "Rosneft", Gazprom Neft and "Surgutneftegaz" hide information about their activities from shareholders. In the future, Navalny will collect a lot of political PR by "trolling" state corporations as a minority shareholder. Navalny will report embezzlement in VTB, Transneft and other state-owned companies.

In 2009, Alexei Navalny became a freelance adviser to the Governor of the Kirov Region, the former leader of the Union of Right Forces, Nikita Belykh.

In 2009, Navalny co-founded the Foundation for Supporting the Initiatives of the Governor of the Kirov Region.

In 2010, having studied in the United States, Alexei Navalny begins systematic work to separate his person as an independent politician.

In November 2010, Navalny spoke at Helsinki Commission of the US Congress, headed by Senator Benjamin Cardin, where hearings were held on corruption in Russia.

In December 2010, Alexei Navalny announced the creation of the project "RosPil" aimed at combating abuses in public procurement.

In May 2011, Navalny launches the project "RosYama" directed, in his words, " to encourage the Russian authorities to improve the condition of roads".

In September 2011, Alexei Navalny established the Anti-Corruption Fund. Entrepreneurs became sponsors of the fund Boris Zimin and . Other public figures also supported the Navalny Foundation, for example, economist Sergei Guriev:

“I publicly supported Navalny. Now they say that many supported Khodorkovsky and advocated for Navalny. This is true. But nine people, including three foreigners, took part in the examination of the second Yukos case. Publicly supported the Fund ... only 16 people, including me and my wife."

On December 5, 2011, Navalny spoke at a government-sanctioned and movement-led rally on Chistoprudny Boulevard. Speaking to a crowd of thousands, Navalny in particular called " party of crooks, thieves and murderers".

After the end of the event, Navalny took part in an unauthorized march to the building of the Russian Central Election Commission on Lubyanka, during which he was detained by the police. Ilya Yashin, an opposition leader and co-chairman of the Solidarity UDM, was detained with him. The next day the judge Olga Borovkova found both guilty of resisting law enforcement officers and sentenced them to 15 days of administrative arrest.

After his release from arrest, Alexei Navalny continued his street activity.

Navalny took part in the rallies on Sakharov Avenue on December 24, 2011, in the procession along Yakimanka on February 4, 2012, in the White Ring action on February 26, in the rally on Pushkin Square on March 5, the "march of millions" on May 6 and other rallies and processions, as an independent political figure.

On May 9, 2012, Navalny was again sentenced to 15 days in prison for participating in an illegal rally on Kudrinskaya Square.

In May 2012, Navalny launches the Kind Machine of Truth campaign project, with the help of which Navalny plans to spread information about abuses and corruption in power.

On October 20-22, 2012 elections were held in Coordinating Council of the Russian Opposition. Navalny, who ran on the civil list, received the largest number of votes - more than 43,000. In addition to him, Garry Kasparov, Ilya Yashin,,, and other opposition figures received a significant number of votes. However, the opposition Constitutional Court did not last even a year.

On November 8, 2012, Navalny launched an Internet service designed to file complaints about various shortcomings in the work of housing and communal services. The service was named "RosZhKH".

On April 4, 2013, on the air of the Dozhd channel, Alexei Navalny announced that he plans to take the post of president of Russia in the future.

In 2013 on early Moscow mayoral elections Alexei Navalny was nominated as the party's candidate. On July 10, 2013, Navalny submitted documents for registration to the Moscow City Electoral Committee, including 115 signatures of municipal deputies (which included representatives of United Russia at the request of the acting mayor of the capital). Sergei Sobyanin himself commented on this fact:

"Honestly, I don't know what the prospects for candidate Navalny are. We have done everything possible to register him so that Muscovites have a greater choice among candidates for mayor of Moscow."

During the elections, Navalny repeatedly announced fundraising in his support. During the campaign, the politician collected about 108 million rubles.

According to the results of the elections held on September 8, 2013, Alexei Navalny took 2nd place and received 27.24% of the votes of active voters.

In the fall of 2013, Alexei Navalny headed an unregistered party "People's Alliance", which was created by his associates in the Anti-Corruption Fund and the Opposition Coordinating Council.

Russian President Vladimir Putin about Alexei Navalny:

"This gentleman saddled a very fashionable topic of fighting corruption. I repeat once again, in order to fight corruption, first of all, you yourself need to be crystal clear. But there are problems. In this regard, I, unfortunately, have a suspicion that this just a way to win points, not a true desire to solve problems."

In 2013, on his blog, Navalny published documents that confirmed the presence of an undeclared apartment with a State Duma deputy from United Russia. Vladimir Pekhtin. As a result of the scandal that broke out in the media, Pekhtin voluntarily resigned his deputy mandate. This scandal was later referred to as "pehting".

In February 2014, the statement of "RosPil" became the reason for the arrest of the Deputy Mayor of Chita Vyacheslav Shulyakovsky, suspected of manipulating the apartments of orphans.

On February 28, 2014, the Basmanny Court changed the measure of restraint for Alexei Navalny from recognizance not to leave to house arrest until April 28: he was forbidden to leave his apartment without the permission of the investigator, use the telephone, mail and Internet, Navalny can communicate only with his relatives. On April 24, the Zamoskvoretsky Court of Moscow extended Navalny's house arrest until October 28, 2014.

During the Crimean events, March 20, 2014, the newspaper The New York Times published an article by Navalny in which he asked for additional sanctions against "Putin's inner circle", in particular, Navalny called on Western countries to freeze financial assets and confiscate the property of large Russian businessmen. The Navalny Anti-Corruption Foundation has prepared an expanded list of persons for sanctions by the European Union. This document was published on the website of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe.

On October 8, 2015, Alexei Navalny was restricted the right to travel abroad due to the fact that he did not pay off a debt in the amount of 4.5 million rubles (according to the lawyer Kobzev, Navalny paid 3 million rubles).

On December 1, 2015, the Anti-Corruption Foundation, headed by Navalny, published the results of its own investigation, in which it was alleged that the prosecutor general's relatives were engaged in illegal activities.

The materials also said that the ex-wife of the Deputy Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation Gennady Lopatin Olga ran a joint business (Sakhar Kuban LLC) with the wives of gang members from stanitsa Kushchevskaya in the Kuban. Lopatina stated that this information is not true.

Prosecutor General Chaika said: It is obvious to me that this is an order that was obviously not executed with the money of the performers. Big money! The information presented is deliberately false and has no basis. It is absolutely clear to me who and what is behind this. I think I'll post it in the near future".

In response, Navalny said that he would file a lawsuit for the protection of honor and dignity.

Scandals, rumors

In the fall of 2006, a number of media reported that the then little-known "Yabloko" Navalny was one of the organizers of the nationalist "Russian March", Navalny himself rejected this. Nevertheless, Navalny subsequently repeatedly took part in the Russian Marches, including in 2006 as an observer from Yabloko.

The media reported that in 2010, many future pro-American "orange revolutionaries" studied at the same Yale course with Navalny: for example, Fares Mabrouk, an activist in the Tunisian revolution, and Lumumba Di-Aping, an activist in the revolution in Sudan.

In 2010, a resident of Penza appealed to law enforcement agencies for "desecrating the coat of arms of Russia" in the form of an image of a two-headed eagle with two saws in its paws on the logo of the RosPil project. In 2011, a similar statement was sent to the Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation by a deputy of the State Duma of the Russian Federation from United Russia.

In April 2011, Alexei Navalny published a post on his blog citing the results of an investigation by the Hermitage Capital Management fund. In July 2011, a businessman Vladlen Stepanov filed a lawsuit against Navalny for the protection of honor, dignity and business reputation, compensation for moral damage. In October 2011, the court decided to partially satisfy the claim and recover 100 thousand rubles from Alexei Navalny, demanding that he publish a refutation of the information.

In August 2011, the infamous hacker hell hacked Navalny's email and made public his correspondence for several years. Navalny's correspondence revealed his connections with a number of politicians, businessmen and public figures, as well as foreign "partners".

In December 2012, the Investigative Committee of Russia opened a criminal case against Alexei Navalny and his brother Oleg Navalny for fraud. According to investigators, Navalny created a company LLC "Main Subscription Agency", with which in the spring of 2008 an unnamed trading company entered into an agreement for the implementation of cargo transportation of mail. In total, 55 million rubles were transferred to the account of the "Main Subscription Agency", while the actual cost of services was 31 million rubles.

In April 2013, the main investigative department TFR filed a criminal case against Oleg Navalny and his brother Alexei on the fact of fraud based on the statement of the general director of LLC "Multipurpose Processing Company" (IPC). According to the investigation, the brothers established the Alortag Management Limited company in Cyprus, which acted as the founder of the Main Subscription Agency LLC (GPA).

In 2008, Oleg Navalny, acting in collusion with his brother, convinced the representatives of the LLC to terminate contracts with direct counterparties for the provision of services for printing invoices, as well as for the delivery of terminal equipment to the regional departments of the federal postal service. This criminal case was combined in one proceeding with the criminal case on charges of the Navalny brothers of fraud against the company "Yves Rocher East".

During the election campaign for the post of mayor of Moscow, it became known that Alexei Navalny, together with Maria Gaidar and Mikhail Eshkin, is the founder of the MRD COMPANY construction company registered on November 20, 2007 in Montenegro.

According to the electoral law, candidates must provide information about income, property and foreign assets, so Navalny's headquarters put forward the version that the site of the Montenegrin tax service was hacked, and later claimed that the company was registered without Navalny's knowledge. However, the Tax Service of Montenegro denied both the version of the hacking of the site and registration without the knowledge of the co-founder, stating that there are documents signed by all the co-founders.

The Central Election Commission of Russia considers the collection of donations for the campaign funds of Alexei Navalny through the Yandex.Money system a violation of electoral and tax laws. In August 2013, the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation announced that they would check the data on the misappropriation by Navalny's supporters of part of the money transferred to his election campaign.

The material claimed that the opposition politician was financed by the authorities through the company of the common-law wife of Vladimir Ashurkov (one of the associates of the opposition leader Alexei Navalny and head of the Anti-Corruption Foundation) Alexandrina Markvo. The authors of the material pointed out that Bureau 17, owned by Markvo, "over and over again won competitions for holding various events for the Moscow City Hall and the Federal Agency for Press and Mass Communications in the period from 2012 to 2014." According to the authors' calculations, Markvo's company earned about 100 million rubles from tenders.

Soon the Investigative Committee of Russia began checking on the information contained in the publication. The investigation sees in it signs of a crime under the article "Fraud committed by an organized group or on an especially large scale" when concluding and executing government contracts.

In August 2014, the human rights society "Memorial" included Alexei Navalny in the list of political prisoners in connection with his placement under house arrest in the case of fraud against "Yves Rocher", in which, according to human rights activists, there are political motives.

The case was considered by a judge of the Zamoskvoretsky Court Elena Korobchenko. The sentencing was expected on January 15, 2015 (on the same day the opposition planned to hold protests on Manezhnaya Square), but then it was unexpectedly postponed to December 30.

On that day, the court announced the operative part of the verdict: Oleg Navalny was sentenced to 3.5 years in a penal colony, Alexei Navalny was given 3.5 years of probation. The brothers must pay more than 4 million rubles to the MPK company, in addition, each of them was sentenced to a fine of 500 thousand rubles.

On the evening of December 30, an unauthorized opposition rally in support of the Navalny brothers took place on Manezhnaya Square. According to media reports, about 1,000 people gathered on the street under police control. The crowd chanted, among other things, pro-Ukrainian slogans "Glory to Ukraine!". There have been several arrests. Including on the way to Manezhnaya Square, Alexei Navalny himself was detained, who, having violated the regime of detention under house arrest, arrived at the rally.

In February 2015, the Russian media reported that opposition leader Alexei Navalny had a cousin in Ukraine who was active in anti-Russian activities.

Earlier, in the summer of 2013, Ukrainian journalists from Vesti discovered the relatives of the disgraced blogger in Ukraine during the elections in Moscow in the summer of 2013. It turned out that the brother of Navalny's father, Ivan Navalny, and his wife Lyubov live in the city of Pereyaslav-Khmelnitsky.

Marina Navalnaya- the daughter of the uncle of the oppositionist and his cousin - turned out to be a very active representative of the anti-Russian propaganda front deployed in Ukraine. He is a city deputy of four convocations of the infamous "People's Party" of Ukraine.

Since November 17, 2013, he has been the head of the Central Council of the liberal political party "Party of Progress".

Participated in the 2013 Moscow mayoral election, where he lost in the first round to Sergei Sobyanin, gaining 632,697 votes (27.24% of the total number of voters) and taking 2nd place.

Since the beginning of the 2010s, he has been accused, witness and person under investigation in a number of criminal, administrative and arbitration cases. On July 18, 2013, he was found guilty by the Leninsky District Court of the city of Kirov of embezzlement of the property of the state company Kirovles and sentenced to five years in a penal colony. He was taken into custody in the courtroom and placed in a pre-trial detention center, but the very next day the Kirov Regional Court changed the preventive measure to a written undertaking not to leave, as a result of which Navalny was released. Navalny's supporters, as well as major human rights organizations, a number of experts and foreign states, condemned the verdict, calling it politically motivated. According to the Levada Center, 46% of Russians surveyed link the persecution of the oppositionist with his anti-corruption activities, and 32% of respondents believe that he was tried "in connection with his illegal actions as an adviser to the governor of the Kirov region." Russian President Vladimir Putin expressed his attitude to the verdict at a meeting with participants in the Seliger forum, calling it "strange." On October 16, the Kirov Regional Court changed Navalny's conviction, imposing a suspended sentence. In 2013, the active part of the Yves Rocher trial also began. On February 28, 2014, the Basmanny Court changed the measure of restraint for Navalny from recognizance not to leave to house arrest for a period until April 28: he was forbidden to leave his apartment without the permission of the investigator, use the telephone, mail and Internet, Navalny can only communicate with his relatives .. Subsequently, at home the arrest was regularly extended until February 15, 2015. On February 20, 2015, Navalny was placed under administrative arrest for 15 days for unsanctioned campaigning in the subway.

On December 19, 2014, the prosecutor's office demanded 10 years in prison for Navalny in the "Yves Rocher case", in which the politician and his brother Oleg are accused of embezzlement and further legalization of funds from the French company Yves Rocher Vostok. In the last word at the trial, Alexei denied the charges against him. On December 30, 2014, the court sentenced Alexei Navalny to 3 years and 6 months probation. At the same time, his brother Oleg, in the same case, received the same, but already a real term.

Alexei Navalny was born on June 4, 1976 in the military town of Butyn, Odintsovo District, Moscow Region.

Navalny's parents currently own the Kobyakovskaya basket weaving factory in the Odintsovo district, where Alexei is the founder.

Father - Anatoly Ivanovich Navalny, co-owner and general director of the Kobyakovskaya wicker weaving factory, was born and graduated from school in Zalesye (formerly the Chernobyl region, now the Ivankovsky region, Kyiv region), after graduating from the Kyiv Military School of Communications, he was appointed near Moscow. Grandfather Ivan Tarasovich was a carpenter and almost all his life, like his wife Tatyana Danilovna, he worked on a local collective farm.

Mother - Lyudmila Ivanovna Navalnaya, co-owner and commercial director of the Kobyakovskaya wicker weaving factory, comes from a rural area near Zelenograd, Moscow Region, studied at the Moscow Institute of Management named after Sergo Ordzhonikidze, worked as a laboratory assistant at the Zelenograd Research Institute of Microdevices, married in 1975 for Anatoly Ivanovich, after graduating from the institute she worked as an economist, since 1987 - deputy director for economics.

Wife - Yulia Borisovna Navalnaya. Two children: daughter Daria (born in 2001) and son Zakhar (born in 2008). Brother - Oleg Anatolyevich Navalny, until May 2013 - Deputy Director of the Automated Sorting Centers company, a branch of the Russian Post, First Deputy Director of the express delivery company EMS Russian Post.

According to A. Navalny, all his relatives lived in Ukraine, and until 1986 he himself spent every summer in the Kyiv region. But after the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, part of the relatives moved to other regions of Ukraine. He considers himself more of a Ukrainian in terms of "some kind of roots and genetics." According to his uncle, more than half of Navalny's relatives live in Zalesye and Pereyaslav-Khmelnitsky.

As of 2015, Navalny lives in the Moscow microdistrict of Maryino.

Education

In 1993, Navalny graduated from the Alabinsky secondary school in the military village of Kalininets in the vicinity of the village of Taraskovo near Moscow, and in 1998 he graduated from the law faculty of the Peoples' Friendship University of Russia.

In 1999, he entered the Faculty of Finance and Credit of the Financial Academy under the Government of the Russian Federation (specialty "Securities and Exchange Business"), graduating in 2001.

Work and business

Navalny owns 25% of the authorized capital of LLC Kobyakovskaya wicker weaving factory (in the Odintsovo district of the Moscow region).

For some time he worked at Aeroflot Bank.

In 1997, he founded Nesna LLC, the main activity of the company was hairdressing services. For some time, "Nesna" handed over "zero" balances, and then was sold.

In 1997 he registered Allekt LLC. In 1998-2005, he held the position of Deputy Director for Legal Affairs in this company. In the 2007 Duma elections, the Allekt company was an advertising agent for the Union of Right Forces party. In total, SPS purchased advertising for 99 million rubles through Allekt, Navalny received a commission of 5% from this, that is, 5 million rubles. As of 2011, Allekt LLC was in the process of liquidation.

In 1998-1999 he worked in the development company ST-Group. Among other things, he dealt with currency control and antitrust law.

In 2000, together with friends from the Faculty of Law of the People's Friendship University of Russia, he opened the firm "N. N. Securities. Navalny was the owner of a 35% stake in this company and served as chief accountant in it. "N. N. Securities traded securities on the stock exchange, as a result, this company went bankrupt. According to Navalny, playing on the stock exchange, he lost "what little money" he had.

In 2001, Navalny co-founded Eurasian Transport Systems LLC. The company was engaged in logistics, earning on road freight.

In 2006, he was the host of the Town-Planning Chronicles program at the Ekho Moskvy radio station.

In 2009, Navalny passed the qualification exam at the Chamber of Advocates of the Kirov Region. In 2010, Navalny transferred to the Moscow City Bar Association. During his legal practice, he participated in 11 cases in arbitration courts, and only in two of them personally, and in other cases, his representatives spoke on his behalf.

In 2009, Navalny founded Navalny and Partners LLC, in 2010 this company was liquidated.

In February 2012, Alexander Lebedev's National Reserve Bank (NRB) (which owns 15% of Aeroflot) nominated Navalny as a candidate for Aeroflot's board of directors. Navalny agreed to become a director, saying that if elected, he would focus on corporate governance and anti-corruption activities. On June 25, 2012, Navalny joined the board of directors of Aeroflot in accordance with the decision of the annual meeting of shareholders. 787 million votes were cast for Navalny, which, with a total number of votes of 12.1 billion, is 6.5% (the votes of the NRB and a number of other minority shareholders). Navalny became a member of the Personnel and Remuneration Committee of the Board of Directors of Aeroflot. In February 2013, it was reported that Navalny had not been nominated as a candidate for the new board of directors of Aeroflot.

Political activity

In 2004, he founded and was one of the leaders of the "Committee for the Protection of Muscovites" - a city-wide movement of opponents of corruption and violation of the rights of citizens during construction in Moscow.

In 2005, together with Maria Gaidar, Natalia Morari and others, he stood at the origins of the YES! Youth Movement. Coordinated the project "Police with the people".

Since 2006 - coordinator of the "Political Debates" project, editor-in-chief of its television version "Fight Club" (TVC, 2007). As the host of the "Political Debates", he took a direct part in the incidents during the debates of Maria Gaidar and Eduard Bagirov, as well as Maxim Kononenko and Yulia Latynina, which were widely covered in the press.

On June 23, 2007, he became one of the co-founders of the People movement. In 2008, he founded the Union of Minority Shareholders, a public organization that protects the rights of private investors. Actively working on the problem of increasing the transparency of the costs of natural monopolies.

In 2009, he was a freelance adviser to the Governor of the Kirov Region, former leader of the Union of Right Forces, Nikita Belykh. In 2009, he co-founded the Foundation for Supporting the Initiatives of the Governor of the Kirov Region.

Party "Yabloko"

In 2000 he joined the Russian United Democratic Party "Yabloko", was a member of the Federal Political Council of this party. In 2002 he was elected to the regional council of the Moscow branch of the Yabloko party. From April 2004 to February 2007 - head of the apparatus of the Moscow regional branch of the RODP "Yabloko".

During the period of party activity, he became friends with SPS functionaries Nikita Belykh and Maria Gaidar.

In December 2007, during a meeting of the Bureau of the Yabloko party on the issue of expelling Navalny from the party, he demanded "the immediate resignation of the chairman of the party and all his deputies, the re-election of at least 70% of the Bureau." He was expelled from the Yabloko party with the wording "for causing political damage to the party, in particular, for nationalist activities." According to Navalny, the real reason for the exclusion was his demand for the resignation of the party's founder, Grigory Yavlinsky.

Movement "People"

In 2007, Navalny became a co-founder of the national democratic movement "People". On June 23-24, 2007, the founding conference of the movement and the first meeting of its political council were held in Moscow. Sergei Gulyaev, Alexei Navalny and Zakhar Prilepin became co-chairs of the movement. On June 25, 2007, the Manifesto of the movement was published with 11 signatures: Sergei Gulyaev, Alexei Navalny, Vladimir Golyshev (editor-in-chief of the NaZlobu.ru website), communist Pyotr Miloserdov, leader of the St. Petersburg branch of the banned National Bolshevik Party Andrei Dmitriev, editor-in-chief of Limonki » Aleksey Volynets, National Bolshevik writer Zakhar Prilepin, Pavel Svyatenkov, Igor Romankov, Mikhail Dorozhkin, Evgeny Pavlenko. Subsequently, the People movement was supposed to join the Other Russia coalition, but this did not happen.

Navalny noted that nationalism is one of the “key, defining points” of the ideology of the movement, and he considers himself to be “normal Russian nationalists.” According to Konstantin Voronkov, the politician's biographer, Navalny "calls himself a national democrat because he separates the nationality from the nation," emphasizing the social rather than the ethnic component of this concept.

Navalny was a participant in the Russian March nationalist marches in 2006 and 2008, first as an observer from Yabloko, then as a representative of the People movement. On the march of 2008, he witnessed the brutal detention of the leader of the "Slavic Union" Dmitry Demushkin by riot police and said that, despite Demushkin's ambiguous reputation, he was ready to testify in court in his defense. In 2011, Navalny announced his intention to continue participating in marches, but in 2013 he motivated his refusal as follows:

My participation in the Russian March will now turn into a hell of a comedy: like Boniface surrounded by children, I will walk in a crowd of 140 photographers and cameramen trying to film me against the backdrop of zigzagging schoolchildren. Naturally, our "Kremlin friends" will do everything to ensure that there are always a lot of these zigging around me.
Navalny about participation in the Russian March, 2013

In 2008, the creation of the "Russian National Movement" was announced, which included the organizations DPNI, "Great Russia" and "People". The co-chairman of the Narod movement, Navalny, promised that the new association would participate in the next elections to the State Duma, having a chance of winning. He noted: “I think such an association will receive a fairly large percentage of votes and will claim victory ... Up to 60 percent of the population adheres to spontaneous nationalism, but it is not politically formalized in any way.”

In June 2008, at the joint conference "New Political Nationalism", DPNI and the "People" movement signed an agreement on cooperation (information exchange, coordination of activities, monitoring of manifestations of Russophobia). Navalny said that the "new political nationalism" is a democratic movement, in which it will give "a hundred points ahead of the note liberals." Navalny considers Alexander Belov's DPNI and Andrei Savelyev's "Great Russia" to be moderate organizations, emphasizing that nationalism "should become the core of Russia's political system."

Navalny attaches great importance to migration policy:

My idea is that this topic should not be tabooed. The failure of our liberal-democratic movement is due to the fact that they, in principle, considered some topics dangerous for discussion, including the topic of national inter-ethnic conflicts. Meanwhile, this is the real agenda. It must be admitted that migrants, including people from the Caucasus, often go to Russia with their own very peculiar values. The Russians overcame this level of prejudice back in the days of Yaroslav the Wise. For example, in Chechnya, women who go without headscarves are shot with a paintball gun, and then Ramzan Kadyrov declares: “Well done guys, real sons of the Chechen people!” Then these Chechens come to Moscow. And I have a wife and daughter here. And I don't like it when people who say that women should be shot with a paintball gun for walking around without headscarves establish their own rules here.

As of 2011, the movement ceased active activity and, according to Navalny, "organizationally did not take place", but formulated a "very correct platform."

Evaluation of the activities of "United Russia"

Navalny is the author of the Internet meme "the party of crooks and thieves" in the context of the United Russia party. The phrase was first uttered on February 2, 2011 on the radio station Finam FM. Shortly thereafter, Shota Gorgadze’s lawyer wrote on his blog that ordinary party members who were offended by Navalny’s statement “have a desire to sue him,” and Gorgadze is ready to help them with this. In response to this, Navalny opened a poll on his blog on February 15, where those who wished to answer the question “Is United Russia a party of thieves and crooks?” Nearly 40,000 people took part in the survey. 96.6% of them answered “yes, they are”. In the course of thousands of discussions of the post, the phrase "party of crooks and thieves" grew into an Internet meme and became a popular query in the Google and Yandex search engines; There is also a website of the same name. On February 21, this story was continued: Evgeny Fedorov, a member of the State Duma, chairman of the Economic Policy Committee, at the request of Finam FM, agreed to participate in the debate in order to refute these accusations. At the end of the program, the presenter conducted an SMS voting: within a minute, 1354 people voted, 99% of whom took the position of Navalny.

On August 17, 2011, the press service of the Lublin Court of Moscow announced that a lawsuit had been filed by the First Vice Speaker of the State Duma, Oleg Morozov, with demands to refute the allegations published on Navalny’s blog of misuse of transport and special signals, and also to refute references to Oleg Morozov as “a prominent representative of the party of crooks and thieves." On the same day, Morozov himself stated that he did not file a lawsuit, but became a victim of a provocation prepared, according to his assumption, by Navalny.

On February 20, the United Russia party, through its press service, announced its refusal to participate in a discussion with Alexei Navalny on the radio station Kommersant FM. In a statement, United Russia suggested that Navalny "not go to radio broadcasts, but to talk with investigators."

United Russia's statement was made against the background of the resignation of the deputy mandate by Vladimir Pekhtin, who held the post of head of the ethics committee in the Duma. Pekhtin decided to leave the State Duma after Alexei Navalny published data that the deputy owns real estate in Miami, which was not indicated in his declarations.

Elections to the State Duma (2011), participation in protests 2011-2013

Alexei Navalny has repeatedly stated that, in his opinion, the most acceptable way to vote in the 2011 State Duma elections is to vote "for any party, against United Russia." Although Navalny himself denies authorship, this position has been commonly referred to as "Navalny's option."

On December 5, 2011, the day after the election, Navalny spoke at a rally sanctioned by the authorities and organized by the Solidarity movement on Chistoprudny Boulevard. The purpose of the rally was to express disagreement with the results of the elections and accuse the authorities of large-scale fraud. Speaking to a crowd of thousands, Navalny specifically called United Russia a "party of swindlers, thieves and murderers." After the end of the event, he, along with several hundred more participants, took part in an unauthorized march to the building of the Central Election Commission of Russia on Lubyanka, during which he was detained by the police. Ilya Yashin, an opposition leader and co-chairman of the Solidarity UDM, was detained with him. The next day, a court session was held, during which judge Olga Borovkova found both guilty of resisting law enforcement officers and sentenced them to 15 days of administrative arrest. This decision caused discontent both among the opposition and among a number of well-known lawyers. In particular, attention was drawn to the fact that the court did not take into account extenuating circumstances - the presence of two minor dependent children and the lack of a criminal history of Navalny. Amnesty International recognized Navalny and Yashin as prisoners of conscience. In December 2014, the European Court of Human Rights found the detention and prosecution of Yashin and Navalny disproportionate to the offenses committed. According to the court, the action was exclusively peaceful, and the small number of participants made it possible for the police to control it. The court ordered the Russian Federation to pay each of the opposition 26,000 euros as compensation.

Navalny was released from custody on December 21 at 2:35 am; despite the late exit time, he was greeted by numerous journalists and supporters. Subsequently, he took part in other protest actions - a rally on Sakharov Avenue on December 24, 2011, a procession along Yakimanka on February 4, 2012, the White Ring on February 26, a rally on Pushkinskaya Square on March 5, a "march of millions" on May 6, a procession on September 15, an unsanctioned rally on Lubyanka Square, a “march against scoundrels”, a rally on Bolotnaya Square on May 6, 2013, numerous pickets and “folk festivals”.

On May 9, 2012, he was again sentenced to arrest for 15 days for participating in an illegal public event that took place in the early morning of that day on Kudrinskaya Square.

On April 4, 2013, on the air of the Dzyadko-3 program on the Dozhd TV channel, Alexei Navalny announced that he planned to take the post of President of Russia in the future. With this step, he "wants to change life in the country", and to ensure that the inhabitants of Russia, a country rich in natural resources, do not live "in poverty and hopeless squalor", but live "normally, as in European countries." Potential electoral support for Navalny in Russia for 2012-2013 was estimated at about 5 percent: according to sociologist Denis Volkov from the Levada Center, in order to increase his rating, Navalny will have to "enter enemy territory" - that is, conquer " voices" not only of opposition-minded citizens, but also of those who support power today, however, "without free access to television, with a rather weak development of alternative channels for disseminating information, it will be difficult for him to do this."

Participation in the elections of the mayor of Moscow

In 2013, in the early elections of the mayor of Moscow, he was nominated as a candidate from the RPR-Parnassus party and appointed the head of the electoral headquarters of the Ural politician Leonid Volkov. On July 10, he submitted documents for registration to the Moscow City Election Commission, including 115 signatures of municipal deputies, and was registered on July 17.

On August 23, in an interview with Ekho Moskvy radio, A. Navalny said that if he wins the elections, the powers of local government will be seriously expanded, conflict situations around any new construction will be resolved by a referendum of local residents, the migration policy of the city will be radically changed, the performance of lezginka in public place by natives of the Caucasus, provoking citizens, will be qualified as a violation of public order, at the same time, gay pride parades will be allowed, as falling under the constitutional right of citizens to assemble peacefully and without weapons. He called the meaning of his political reform a change in the system in such a way that in case of dissatisfaction with his activities as the head of the city, the townspeople could immediately remove him from this post and choose a new mayor.

According to one of the LiveJournal bloggers during the election campaign, it became known that A. Navalny (together with Maria Gaidar and Mikhail Eshkin) is the founder of the construction company MRD COMPANY, registered on November 20, 2007 in Montenegro. At the same time, attention is drawn to the fact that, according to the electoral legislation, candidates must provide information on income, property and foreign assets. The head of Navalny's campaign headquarters, Leonid Volkov, put forward a version that the site of the tax service of Montenegro was hacked, and later claimed that the company was registered without Navalny's knowledge. However, the Tax Service of Montenegro denied both the version of the hacking of the site and registration without the knowledge of the co-founder, stating that there are documents signed by all the co-founders. The Tax Service of Montenegro noted that the company did not register with the tax authorities and did not conduct any activity from the moment of registration. The head of the Moscow City Electoral Committee, Valentin Gorbunov, said that Russian law prohibits candidates from having real estate and accounts abroad, but there is no direct ban on foreign business in other countries. Meanwhile, Navalny, according to Gorbunov, has neither accounts nor securities abroad.

According to the voting results, he received 27.24% of the votes of active voters (632,697 votes), gaining more votes than Melnikov (KPRF), Mitrokhin (Yabloko), Degtyarev (LDPR) and Levichev (Fair Russia) combined and losing only to the acting mayor of Moscow Sergei Sobyanin with his 51.37%. He received the greatest support in the central regions of Moscow, the least - on the periphery of the city and the annexed territories. He did not recognize Sobyanin's victory in the first round, repeatedly stated that the decisive 1.37% of Sobyanin was obtained through the use of "administrative resource" (otherwise a "second round" should have been held), filed an application with the Moscow City Court demanding to reconsider election results due to violations. On September 20, the Moscow City Court refused to satisfy Navalny's demands.

Progress Party

In 2012, he supported the People’s Alliance party, which was created by his associates in the Anti-Corruption Foundation and the Opposition Coordinating Council and positioned itself as a “party of Navalny’s supporters”, but for some time refrained from formally joining the party, fearing to reduce the likelihood of its registration and bring it to the attention of the investigating authorities. In 2013, after the Ministry of Justice of Russia twice refused to register the party (the party itself considered the grounds for refusing registration to be far-fetched), it decided to change tactics and officially join the organizing committee of the party. At the new founding congress, he was elected chairman of its governing body - the Central Council. At the end of 2013, it became known that one of the already officially registered Russian political parties decided to change its name to the People's Alliance, which made it impossible for Navalny's party to register under that name. However, the party submitted documents to the Ministry of Justice and was refused. In February 2014, it was decided to rename the "People's Alliance" into the "Party of Progress" - and on February 25 it was officially registered. However, in order to obtain the right to participate in the elections, a party must separately register at least in most subjects of the Russian Federation within 6 months. After 6 months from the date of registration, the "Party of Progress" could not boast of having registration in most subjects. At the same time, according to party members, as well as a number of other politicians, journalists, sociologists and ordinary citizens, decisions to refuse registration of the party's regional branches are illegal. Currently, the Progress Party is still officially registered, but does not have the right to participate in elections.

International activity

In November 2010, the Helsinki Commission of the US Congress, headed by Senator Benjamin Cardin, held hearings on corruption in Russia. One of the Russian speakers at the hearings was Navalny. The speakers' testimonies were published in the Congress Gazette. Gazeta.ru wrote that "Navalny's main recommendation to the Americans is a more stringent enforcement of American laws proper aimed at protecting property and combating money laundering." Navalny claimed that the commission was positive about such an idea.

On March 20, 2014, during the Crimean crisis, The New York Times published an article by Navalny asking for more sanctions against "Putin's inner circle". In particular, Navalny called on Western countries to freeze financial assets and confiscate the property of major Russian businessmen. The Navalny Anti-Corruption Foundation has prepared an expanded list of persons for sanctions by the European Union. This document was published on the website of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe.

Social activity

According to the Vedomosti newspaper, in the spring of 2008, Navalny bought shares in Rosneft, Gazprom, Lukoil, Surgutneftegaz, and Gazprom Neft for about 300,000 rubles. Then he began to fight for his rights as a minority shareholder.

According to the Kommersant publishing house, Navalny is a minority shareholder in large Russian companies, including Surgutneftegaz, Transneft, Rosneft, Gazpromneft, Gazprom, TNK-BP, and VTB Bank. According to journalist Oleg Kashin, “Navalny has shares in almost all major Russian companies, and as a minority shareholder, he regularly causes scandals, accusing the top management of companies of numerous abuses.” By filing lawsuits against the management of companies, it seeks disclosure of information on issues that directly affect the income of shareholders and the transparency of companies.

On May 15, 2008, Alexei Navalny announced that he and a group of like-minded people intend to find out why the oil of the largest Russian state-owned companies is being sold by the Gunvor trader and who its beneficial owners are; he said that the companies Rosneft, Gazprom Neft and Surgutneftegaz, whose management was unsuccessfully contacted by minority shareholders for clarification about Gunvor, are hiding information from shareholders about their cooperation with the oil trader.

Statement of theft in VTB

In 2006, a subsidiary of VTB Bank, VTB-Leasing, purchased 30 drilling rigs manufactured by the Chinese company Sichuan Honghua Petroleum Equipment from the Cypriot company Clusseter Limited. The amount of this contract amounted to $456.9 million. The third party to the contract (the lessee) was the Russian company Well Drilling Corporation, which, in turn, had a contract for the transfer of drilling rigs to the sublease of the Northern Expedition company (both companies belonged to the same shareholders headed by Yuri Livshits). Well Drilling made an advance payment of $45 million, but at the end of 2008, when the crisis broke out, it stopped paying under the contract, and then fell into bankruptcy proceedings. The same fate befell the Northern Expedition. At the same time, VTB Leasing in 2009 had unexpected problems with the return of the property itself - the Grant company, also affiliated with Livshits, which had the installations in storage, wanted to keep them and resell them. A long trial followed, which ended not in favor of Livshits and Grant.

In November 2009, during litigation between VTB-Leasing and Grant, Navalny published on his blog an entry about the purchase of drilling rigs by VTB Bank in China in 2007 through an intermediary company for a price one and a half times higher than the market price. He accused the management of VTB and VTB-Leasing of embezzlement, the amount of which, according to his estimates, amounted to $156 million. Navalny also released copies of documents related to the deal. In addition, Navalny argued that in fact the units were not actually leased, but, as his 2009 trip showed, lay in an open-air swamp at the Purpe station. Later, in a conversation with blogger Rustem Adagamov, Navalny admitted that comparing the place of storage of installations with a swamp was an artistic exaggeration.

Navalny's main argument is that the cost of drilling rigs was actually $10 million per installation, and not $15 million for which VTB bought. As the main evidence of this price, Alexey cited parts of the agreement between the Cypriot offshore and the Chinese plant and an independent expert assessment of drilling rigs by the Expert company.

However, in September 2012, the media questioned the authenticity of the contract presented by the blogger. In addition to the fact that Navalny never laid out the contract in full, it contains completely blank pages, including the “Equipment Arrival Confirmation” application page. Also, on the copy of the contract, there are no characteristic traces of firmware, “with which such documents are always fastened in order to avoid forgery of individual pages.” The Chinese plant has not confirmed the existence of the contract.

The expert opinion on the price of the drilling rig also raised doubts. On the first page of this document, it appears that the assessment was carried out by Expert by order of the very Grant company that sued VTB-Leasing.

The director of "Expert" was Vadim Yaroslavtsev. In the company, he worked together with his wife Elmira. On some electronic sites on the Internet, you can easily find ads for the sale of drilling rigs on behalf of Elmira Yaroslavtseva. Judging by the numbers, these are the same installations that Grant tried to sue from VTB. Also in September 2012, it turned out that Alexei Navalny was familiar with the owner of the Grant company, Vadim Smolyar, actively corresponded with him and met. The media suggested that Smolyar could help the blogger with information about the details of the deal. Later, at a meeting of VTB Bank's shareholders' advisory board in September 2012, Navalny confirmed that he had received most of the documents from CJSC Grant.

The Department of Economic Crimes of the Moscow Department of Internal Affairs, which conducted an investigation into this transaction, reported that no violations were found. According to Oleg Anisimov, a member of the Advisory Board of VTB Shareholders, who referred to the words of Andrey Kostin, partly as a result of these transactions, the head of VTB-Leasing was fired.

In March 2011, Navalny filed a lawsuit against VTB in Cyprus, paying 70,000 euros in legal fees.

In June 2011, an arbitration court was held on Navalny's claim to invalidate the deal. By a court decision, Navalny's claim was denied.

Speaking at the annual meeting of shareholders in 2011, Andrey Kostin said that he applied to law enforcement agencies, there were repeated checks - no corpus delicti was found there. In confirmation of these words, VTB posted on the Internet a copy of its 2009 statement to the Ministry of Internal Affairs and photographs and videos of working drilling rigs.

At the annual meeting of shareholders in 2012, Andrey Kostin, answering a question about drilling rigs, said that 20 rigs were already in operation, and 10 were leased. He also invited interested minority shareholders to check his words and visit the regions where drilling rigs are located.

In early September 2012, VTB organized a trip for minority shareholders, journalists and bloggers to VTB-Leasing's drilling rigs in the Orenburg Region and the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District.

Alexei Navalny was also invited to participate in the trip, but he could not go, as he was under house arrest at that time, and the investigation refused his application to participate in the trip.

After the trip, on September 26, a meeting of the advisory board of shareholders of VTB Bank was held, at which Alexei Navalny was present. As a result of the meeting, the bank said that "the members of the advisory council had no questions left on the problem under discussion." Navalny said that "everyone stayed to his own": in his opinion, the bank is pressing on the fact that drilling rigs are working. At the same time, a minority shareholder who was present at the meeting and previously spoke in favor of Navalny’s version, Vladimir Sinyakov, pointed out that “there are two sides: there is efficiency, but there is theft, and the fact of theft has not been proven”, as well as “the connection of VTB-Leasing “with the Cyprus offshore”. Some shareholders participating in the meeting came to the same conclusions. .

Also, some of VTB's minority shareholders began to doubt that Navalny was actually pursuing the interests of the bank's shareholders by starting lawsuits with VTB, since the recognition of the transaction through the court as invalid threatened the state-owned company with losses of about $ 500 million and deprivation of equipment that makes a profit.

Statement on theft in Transneft

On November 16, 2010, Alexei Navalny published documents, according to him, containing information about major theft during the implementation of the Eastern Siberia - Pacific Ocean (ESPO) pipeline system project, implemented by the natural monopoly Transneft. Navalny said that the total amount of theft according to all the documents that he has is more than 120 billion rubles. According to Navalny, these documents are the result of an internal audit of the ESPO construction by Transneft experts. Navalny's statement was followed by a number of publications in the media.

The head of the Accounts Chamber of the Russian Federation, Sergei Stepashin, said that an earlier audit of the Accounts Chamber did not reveal $ 4 billion in embezzlement. Navalny, in turn, accused Stepashin of hiding crimes, saying that none of the thefts that refute the fact indicates the falsification of the documents provided.

The auditor of the Accounts Chamber, Mikhail Beskhmelnitsyn, said that the scandal could have been raised by order of participants in the redistribution of the market in Southeast Asia. He noted that the amount of damage announced in March 2010 by Stepashin in the report on the work of the Accounts Chamber for the year amounted to 3.5 billion rubles. Navalny claimed that no criminal cases were opened on this fact. This statement by Navalny contradicts Stepashin's statement of 24 March 2010 that a criminal case had been initiated.

Vladimir Milov challenged the "official use" classification, recalling that the construction of the ESPO was carried out on loans from state banks and that the majority of the company's shares are state-owned, which means that the company has the right to familiarize itself with these documents.

On December 29, 2010, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin announced that the prosecutor's office would check the case.

On February 14, 2011, the Moscow Arbitration Court ordered Transneft to issue the documents requested by shareholders (minutes of the board of directors), which, according to Alexei Navalny, is a big victory and makes it possible to "read what they are hiding there." On April 21, 2011, the Ninth Arbitration Court of Appeal upheld this decision.

In November 2010, the leadership of Transneft refused to comment on these documents in any way, citing the fact that Navalny's blog is not a mass media. On May 21, 2011, Nikolai Tokarev, president of Transneft, announced that he would challenge the court's decision to release the documents. At the same time, Transneft Vice-President Mikhail Barkov called Navalny a rogue and accused him of working “in the interests of those who fraudulently bought up Transneft preferred shares for a pittance and are now speculating on them, posing as an investor.”

The leak of documents led to the dismissal of one of the auditors of Transneft-Finance Ruslan Glazunov.

Russian public initiative

On April 5, 2013, Alexei Navalny posted on the Russian Public Initiative (ROI) portal a bill that would ban officials and employees of state corporations from buying cars worth more than 1.5 million rubles. on budgetary funds, as well as on funds of legal entities with state participation. The rules of the ROI portal are such that if the initiative collects 100,000 signatures within a year, it will be considered by the authorities.

As of the end of May 2013, after several weeks of portal operation, Navalny's initiative was the most popular. At the same time, a number of observers, including the deputy of the Yekaterinburg City Duma Leonid Volkov, pointed out that the portal may be "cheating" votes for other initiatives. On July 10, 2013, Navalny's initiative was the first on the website to gain the required 100,000 votes and should soon be considered by parliament.

Projects

Foundation for the Support of Democratic Initiatives

In 2005, Navalny, together with Denis Terekhov, founded the Foundation for the Support of Democratic Initiatives.

RosPil

In December 2010, Alexei Navalny announced the creation of the project "RosPil" dedicated to combating abuses in public procurement. The project works according to the following scheme: website users identify alleged corrupt procurement tenders (as a rule, using the official public procurement portal), professional experts evaluate tenders in terms of possible corruption, project lawyers, based on the examinations carried out, write complaints to regulatory authorities (primarily to Federal Antimonopoly Service) in order to cancel corrupt purchases. Experts and users involved in the search for corrupt procurement are volunteers. Lawyers, on the other hand, are employees of RosPil, that is, they receive salaries for their work from the project's funds. To finance the project, a collection of private donations was organized, transferred through the Yandex.Money payment system.

As of May 2, 2011, the project claims a total amount of discovered frauds of 1.6 billion rubles, the amount of frauds stopped (estimated as the total amount of canceled tenders) of 337 million rubles. For six months of the project's existence (as of mid-June 2011), 41 public procurements have been considered.

RosPil is not registered as a legal entity, since, according to Navalny, compared to the chosen method of organization and financing, “the method of creating a legal entity, some kind of non-profit fund or NPO is much more formalized and fraught with checks, nit-picking and endless commissions."

In April 2011, the project received The BOBs award in the nomination "The Most Useful Resource for Society".

RosYama

May 30, 2011 Navalny launched an Internet project "RosYama", aimed, according to him, to encourage the Russian authorities to improve the condition of the roads. On the pages of the project, users are invited to post photos of damaged sections of roads with an indication of the location of the picture. After that, the system automatically generates the text of the complaint, which is proposed to be submitted to the traffic police. After 37 days (the period for considering a complaint established by the current legislation), the system also automatically generates a letter to the prosecutor's office, which is proposed to be sent if there is no response to the complaint.

RosVybory

January 24, 2012 Navalny announced the launch of the project RosVybory in which he became the ideological inspirer. The main task of "RosVyborov" was called the organization of observation of the presidential elections in 2012. As a result, the project, which operated jointly with representatives of political parties and public associations, sent about 12,000-17,000 observers to polling stations.

Anti-Corruption Foundation

In September 2011, Navalny became the founder of the Anti-Corruption Fund. The first donors of the fund were Boris Zimin and Vladimir Ashurkov.

In May 2012, it became known that Alexei Navalny was launching a new project "+1% to self-respect", where it is planned to issue bank cards, and 1% of the cost of purchases on such a card (the percentage will be taken not from the owner's account, but from the commission of the payment system ) will be transferred to Navalny's Anti-Corruption Fund. As of March 2013, the map is "under development". In December 2012, it was reported that the NRB stopped issuing such a card.

good machine of truth

« good machine of truth» - campaign project; the mechanism by which Navalny plans to disseminate information about abuses and corruption in power. Launched May 29, 2012 as "Kind Propaganda Machine". Aimed primarily at an audience that receives information from television and does not use the Internet.

RosZhKH

On November 8, 2012, Navalny launched an Internet service designed to file complaints about various shortcomings in the work of housing and communal services. The service was named "RosZhKH".

The site contains 26 blanks of complaints about the work of public utilities. To apply, it is enough to enter your address and name, and briefly state the essence of the problem. After that, the complaint is automatically sent to several supervisory authorities.

With the help of "RosZhKH" you can send a complaint about the work of utilities in all regions of Russia. To do this, there is a database of e-mail addresses of all involved departments. By law, an appeal by e-mail is required to review and eliminate deficiencies within 45 days. In the first week alone, about 96,000 calls to utilities were sent through the service.

Other investigations

In August 2010, Alexei Navalny announced the illegality of Vladimir Putin piloting a Be-200 aircraft while extinguishing forest fires. At the same time, he recalled that under similar circumstances, when an unprepared person was sitting at the helm of the aircraft, there was a plane crash over Mezhdurechensk. The Federal Air Transport Agency could not indicate which agency should deal with this issue due to the “multifaceted” nature of the problem.

In 2013, on his blog, Navalny published documents that confirmed the presence of an undeclared apartment in the State Duma deputy from United Russia, Vladimir Pekhtin. As a result of the scandal that broke out in the media, Pekhtin voluntarily resigned his deputy mandate. In the future, this scandal was called "pehting".

In February 2014, the statement of RosPil became the reason for the arrest of the Deputy Mayor of Chita, Vyacheslav Shulyakovsky, who was suspected of manipulating the apartments of orphans.

A. Navalny announced that First Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Federation I. Shuvalov had an apartment in the center of London.

Legal persecution

A criminal case has been opened against Alexei Navalny
TFR believes that Navalny is "teasing the authorities"
The prosecutor demanded six years in prison for Navalny
The court found Alexei Navalny guilty and sentenced to five years in prison
The prosecution asked to release Navalny and Ofitserov
Navalny released on bail and will take part in the elections

The pre-investigation check against Navalny on the facts of possible damage to the Kirov state enterprise Kirovles began in August 2009. The initiator of the investigation was Sergey Karnaukhov, the then vice-governor of the Kirov region for security and the fight against corruption.

In May 2011, it became known that a criminal case was initiated against Navalny under Article 165 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (“causing property damage by deceit or breach of trust in the absence of signs of theft”). According to investigators, Navalny misled the director of the State Unitary Enterprise Kirovles Vyacheslav Opalev, persuading him to conclude an unprofitable contract. Navalny introduced himself as an adviser to the governor of the Kirov region Nikita Belykh, although at that time he was no longer such, and promised Opalev support from the authorities of the region. The amount of damage caused to the enterprise was estimated at 1.3 million rubles.

The case was dismissed on April 10, 2012 due to lack of corpus delicti, but was resumed again by order of the leadership of the Investigative Committee of Russia on May 29, 2012. On July 2, 2012, a fragment of Navalny's correspondence was published, on the basis of which a request was sent to the Prosecutor General's Office, and the Duma took control of the verification of information. On July 31, 2012, Navalny was charged under Part 3 of Art. 33, part 4 of Art. 160 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (organization of embezzlement of another's property on an especially large scale).

In January 2013, the Main Investigation Department of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation completed the investigation against Navalny in the Kirovles case. In the final version, the accusation began to look as follows. Navalny, together with his accomplices, created the Vyatka Forest Company, which played the role of a “laying company” between the Kirovles state enterprise and the final recipients of Kirovles timber products. At the same time, VLK purchased timber products from Kirovles at clearly understated prices, and sold them to end consumers at market prices, thereby causing damage to Kirovles. These actions were the theft of timber products belonging to Kirovles on an especially large scale, committed by embezzlement. Navalny, according to the state prosecution, was the organizer of this crime.

According to the defendants' defense, VLK was an ordinary company that was engaged in the legal trade in timber products. The purchase of timber products from Kirovles by VLK was carried out at market prices. Accordingly, Navalny did not commit the crimes that he is accused of. The investigation in the case, according to the defense, used an unlawful, broad interpretation of Art. 160 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (“Assignment or embezzlement”).

On March 19, 2013, the Investigative Committee submitted to the Prosecutor General's Office a criminal case on the embezzlement in Kirovles, and by March 20, all 29 volumes of the case were checked and transferred to the court of the Leninsky district of the Kirov region. On April 17, 2013, the trial began in the case, which is led by Judge Sergei Blinov. At the first meeting, the defendants' lawyers filed a motion to postpone the trial for a month due to the entry of an additional lawyer into the process and the need to familiarize themselves with all 29 volumes of the case. Judge Sergei Blinov postponed the meeting for a week - until April 24.

On July 5, Navalny delivered his last word in court. On July 18, the verdict was announced: 5 years in a general regime colony and a fine of 500 thousand rubles. The judge changed Navalny's measure of restraint until the sentence entered into force, and Navalny was taken into custody in the courtroom and sent to a pre-trial detention center. Only after the verdict came into force (after an appeal) could Navalny be removed from the election of the mayor of Moscow and sent to a colony.

Navalny's verdict received significant public outcry. Representatives of a number of countries around the world, including the United States and Germany, condemned the verdict. the next day he almost completely won back this fall).

On July 18, 2013, "people's gatherings" were held in Moscow, St. Petersburg and about 20 other cities against the arrest of Alexei Navalny and Pyotr Ofitserov. According to various sources, from 4 to 20 thousand people gathered in Moscow. Manezhnaya (where the gathering was planned) and Red Square were blocked by the police, so the protesters filled the sidewalks of the nearest streets: Okhotny Ryad from Manezhnaya to Teatralnaya Square and Tverskaya Street from the intersection with Okhotny Ryad to the City Hall building. In Moscow, the police detained 194 people, in St. Petersburg - 59.

On the evening of the day of the verdict, it became known that the prosecutor's office did not demand that Navalny be taken into custody in the courtroom and would appeal the verdict in this part. The next day, Navalny was temporarily released by a higher court on a subscription pending the entry into force of the verdict.

On the same day, one of the leaders of United Russia, deputy Yevgeny Fedorov, said in an interview that the order to the prosecutor's office to release Navalny came from "Obama and his apparatus", and that "the United States, with its aircraft carriers, with its nuclear weapons, guarantees Navalny personal immunity."

Economist Sergei Guriev said that even before the verdict, he was informed that Navalny would receive a long prison term, and "special operations" would be carried out against those who publicly supported him. He informed Navalny about this, but Navalny replied that he "will continue to do what he must." Guriev sharply criticized the verdict, saying that "everyone who has become familiar with the Kirovles case knows that a fair verdict can only be acquitted."

On October 16, 2013, the Kirov Regional Court changed the conviction, giving Navalny a suspended sentence. The verdict came into force. During the suspended sentence, Navalny, in accordance with the law, will not be able to take part in the elections.

According to a number of foreign and oppositional Russian media, public and political figures, lawyers and human rights activists, the accusations against the defendants in the Kirovles case are untenable, and the case itself is an exemplary political process. Official representatives of the Russian authorities, individual politicians and political scientists, as well as some lawyers consider the accusations against the defendants to be justified, and the case is not political.

RosPil logo

The image of a double-headed eagle with two saws in its paws on the logo of the RosPil project became the reason for statements to law enforcement agencies about the alleged desecration of the coat of arms of Russia. In 2010, a statement to the police was sent by a resident of Penza, initiation of a criminal case was denied due to the absence of a crime event. In 2011, a similar statement was sent to the Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation by a deputy of the State Duma of the Russian Federation from United Russia.

Lawsuit from Vladlen Stepanov

On April 18, 2011, Alexei Navalny published a message on his blog citing the results of an investigation by the Hermitage Capital Management fund about the involvement of entrepreneur Vladlen Stepanov in the theft of funds, and a video created on the basis of this investigation was embedded. On July 29, Stepanov filed a lawsuit against Navalny for the protection of honor, dignity and business reputation and demanded compensation for non-pecuniary damage in the amount of one million rubles. On October 17, 2011, the court decided to partially satisfy the claim and recover 100 thousand rubles from Navalny, demanding that he publish a refutation of the information.

The case of the company "Main Subscription Agency"

On December 14, 2012, the Investigative Committee of Russia posted on its website information that a criminal case was initiated against Alexei Navalny and his brother Oleg Navalny on the fact of committing crimes under Part 4 of Art. 159, p.p. "a", "b" part 2 of Art. 174.1 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (fraud committed by an organized group on an especially large scale and legalization of funds acquired as a result of a crime by a group of persons by prior agreement and using their official position).

According to investigators, Navalny created the Main Subscription Agency LLC company, with which in the spring of 2008 an unnamed trading company entered into an agreement to carry out cargo transportation of mail. According to the investigation, the agreement was concluded with the participation of Oleg Navalny, who at that time worked as the head of the Department of Internal Mailings of the FSUE Russian Post branch - Automated Sorting Centers, who convinced the company's managers to conclude an agreement at a deliberately inflated cost. At the same time, the “Main Subscription Agency” did not have its own material base for transportation, and in fact they were engaged in another enterprise, which was led by an acquaintance of Oleg Navalny. Later it became known that a criminal case against the brothers Alexei and Oleg Navalny was initiated at the request of the head of the Russian division of the cosmetic company Yves Rocher, Bruno Leproux. His application addressed to the head of the ICR, Alexander Bastrykin, was received by the Investigative Committee on December 10, and on the same day the materials of the criminal case were submitted to a separate proceeding.

According to the RF IC, a total of 55 million rubles were transferred to the account of the “Main Subscription Agency”, while the actual cost of services was 31 million rubles. Most of this amount was, according to the investigation, spent by the Navalny brothers for their own needs, and more than 19 million rubles were legalized by the Navalny by concluding fictitious contracts with the Kobyakovskaya basket weaving factory, the founders of which were, among other things, the Navalny brothers themselves.

Navalny himself called the accusations " complete nonsense", and the initiated case -" virtual". In turn, the mother of Alexei Navalny, Lyudmila, said that she considers the actions of the Investigative Committee an attempt to put pressure on the family and an attempt to prevent her son from participating in the opposition rally on December 15.

On May 6, 2013, the Moscow City Court overturned the decision of the Basmanny Court to recognize as legal the initiation of a criminal case against opposition leader Alexei Navalny and his brother Oleg, sending a complaint about its legality for reconsideration.

In August 2014, the Memorial human rights society included Alexei Navalny on the list of political prisoners in connection with his placement under house arrest in the Yves Rocher fraud case, which, according to human rights activists, has political motives.

The case was considered by the judge of the Zamoskvoretsky Court Elena Korobchenko. The sentencing was expected on January 15, 2015 (on the same day it was proposed to hold a People's Assembly in support of Navalny), but then it was unexpectedly postponed to an earlier date.

On December 30, 2014, the court announced the operative part of the verdict: Oleg Navalny was sentenced to 3.5 years in a penal colony, Alexei Navalny was given 3.5 years of probation. The brothers must pay more than 4 million rubles to the MPK company, in addition, each of them was sentenced to a fine of 500 thousand rubles.

According to professor of sociology of law Vadim Volkov, the "Navalny brothers case" shows the legal vulnerability of entrepreneurs in Russia and, along with other "custom political cases", reduces the level of trust in the Russian judicial system. Experts interviewed by RBC believe that the real term for Navalny will be a signal to entrepreneurs that it is dangerous to do business in Russia.

The Allekt case

On December 24, 2012, the Investigative Committee of Russia posted on its website information that materials on the embezzlement in 2007 by the Allekt company headed by Navalny of funds belonging to the Union of Right Forces political party were singled out for separate proceedings, in connection with which a criminal case on the grounds of a crime under Part 4 of Art. 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (fraud).

According to the investigation, in April 2007, an agreement was concluded between the political party "Union of Right Forces" and the company "Allekt" for the provision of advertising services. In total, about 100 million rubles were received from the political party to the settlement account of the Allekt company under the agreement. In turn, the Allekt company transferred the received funds to the accounts of firms, most of which had signs of pseudo-enterprises or so-called one-day firms.

Navalny himself denied the accusations, arguing that the investigators simply came up with a figure of 100 million, and it has nothing to do with reality. The head of the Union of Right Forces in 2007, Nikita Belykh, also denies the fact of the theft of party money by the Allekt firm.

The case of MPK LLC

On April 18, 2013, the main investigative department of the TFR opened a criminal case against Oleg Navalny and his brother Alexei on the fact of fraud based on the statement of the general director of LLC "Multipurpose Processing Company" (MPK).

According to the investigation, the brothers created the Alortag Management Limited company in Cyprus, which acted as the founder of the Main Subscription Agency LLC (GPA). In 2008, Oleg Navalny, acting in collusion with his brother, convinced the representatives of the LLC to terminate contracts with direct counterparties for the provision of services for printing invoices, as well as for the delivery of terminal equipment to the regional departments of the federal postal service.

According to the investigators, the MPK was forced to conclude a “deliberately unprofitable contract at significantly inflated prices” with the GPA for a total of 9 million rubles, and as a result, it suffered damage in the amount of at least 3.8 million rubles. This money was transferred to the accounts of the GPA, and then, as the investigation believes, was stolen by the Navalny brothers.

This criminal case was combined in one proceeding with the criminal case on charges of fraud against the Navalny brothers in relation to the Yves Rocher Vostok company.

According to Alexei Navalny, his brother Oleg Navalny had previously been contacted by the IPC, who said that the investigators were carrying out seizures from them and "strongly advised to write a statement."

On April 21, 2014, on the politician's blog, run by employees of the Anti-Corruption Foundation due to his being under house arrest, copies of the materials of the criminal case on the embezzlement of Yves Rocher's funds were presented, indicating that there was no damage to Yves Rocher. The authorized representative of this campaign, in a petition to the investigation in February 2013, notes that when working with the company of the Navalny brothers, the prices in the transportation contracts were average market prices or lower (from 4% to 15%), Yves Rocher reported no damage or lost profits in the conclusion of these contracts. The appeal also states that the assumption of possible damage arose from the general director of Yves Rocher Vostok, Bruno Leproux, only after interrogations of the company's employees in the framework of a criminal case and seizure of documents.

Navalny turned to the head of the Investigative Committee, Alexander Bastrykin, with a request to bring to justice the investigators who opened a criminal case against obviously innocent people. The politician also noted that the materials of the criminal case do not contain a refutation of the data he cited about the absence of damage to the Yves Rocher company.

Accusation of illegally obtaining a lawyer's status

On February 27, 2013, the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation announced that Alexei Navalny was interrogated in the main investigation department on the circumstances of his obtaining a lawyer's status. During the investigation of the criminal case on the facts of embezzlement of the property of the Kirovles company, the investigation “had doubts about the legality of obtaining lawyer status” in 2009 by Alexei Navalny, who at that time was an adviser to the governor of the Kirov region. The investigation concluded that the information submitted by Navalny to the qualification commission of the Chamber of Advocates of the Kirov Region regarding the fact that he had more than two years of experience in the legal specialty is unreliable.

At the same time, Alexei Navalny said that he was summoned for interrogation by 12:00, and a press release published at 10:40 was already announcing his refusal to testify. The official representative of the Investigative Committee, Vladimir Markin, stated on his Twitter that the interrogation was carried out much earlier and now the oppositionist was summoned to familiarize himself with the materials of the criminal case. However, before that, Markin said that Navalny's interrogation took place on Wednesday.

On February 27, 2013, the president of the Moscow Chamber of Lawyers, Henry Reznik, announced that the council would check the Investigative Committee's assertion that Navalny had illegally obtained the status of a lawyer. To do this, however, it is necessary that the IC transfer the materials to the Department of Justice, which will send a submission to the chamber on deprivation of status.

Marina Kapyrina, president of the Bar Association of the Kirov Region, said that Navalny had submitted all the necessary documents, which were checked for authenticity.

Lawsuit from Konstantin Kostin

In September 2013, Navalny published critical information on his blog about the Civil Society Development Fund and its head Konstantin Kostin, who filed a lawsuit for the protection of honor, dignity and business reputation, because he was called a "swindler", and the fund headed by him - "specializing in any blackmail, forgeries, falsifications. In February 2014, the Lyublinsky District Court of Moscow partially satisfied Kostin's claim, recovering 100 thousand rubles from Navalny. In May 2014, the Moscow City Court confirmed this decision and increased compensation by 5 times. Navalny did not agree with the court's verdict, which entered into force: in his opinion, the Russian courts did not see the difference between statements of fact and value judgments. At the end of July, Navalny complained about the decision of the Lublin court to the European Court of Human Rights.

Lawsuit from Sergey Neverov

In April 2014, Deputy Chairman of the State Duma of the Russian Federation S. Neverov filed a lawsuit against Navalny for the protection of honor and dignity. On April 24, the Lublin Court of Moscow satisfied Neverov's claim, recognizing the information about his alleged undeclared property in a dacha cooperative near Moscow, which Navalny published on November 27, 2013, as untrue. In July, the Moscow City Court confirmed the decision of the Lublin court, it entered into force. Navalny challenged this decision in the ECtHR.

Page blocking in LiveJournal

In the court decision to place A. Navalny under house arrest, access to the Internet was also prohibited. Despite this, new entries continued to appear on the politician's blog in LiveJournal, but already signed by his wife and employees of the Anti-Corruption Foundation. On March 13, 2014, by decision of Roskomnadzor, on the instructions of the Prosecutor General's Office, Navalny's page in LiveJournal was blocked. The reason for the blocking was the violation of “the provision of the court decision on the choice of a measure of restraint for the citizen against whom a criminal case has been initiated.” Later, the Prosecutor General's Office clarified that the page was blocked for inciting riots.

Also, at the request of Roskomnadzor, access to a copy of A. Navalny's blog (including his notes published before his arrest) posted on the website of the Ekho Moskvy radio station was blocked.

On April 9, 2014, a new blog of A. Navalny was opened without old posts on a separate domain navalny.com. oppositionist's blog was blocked. On July 28, the Moscow City Court still recognized as legal the decision to block the blog, which occurred due to the entries “The Kremlin puffed out its cheeks” and “Anti-Maidanists: do not try to be holier than the Pope”, dedicated to the Ukrainian Euromaidan and the announcement of the verdict in the Bolotnaya case. The claim of the General Prosecutor's Office to these recordings is due to the presence in them of information about an uncoordinated protest action near the Zamoskvoretsky Court, which took place on February 21 and 24, 2014. The Prosecutor General's Office considered that the author of the blog called for participation in this action. At the same time, a representative of Roskomnadzor, Maria Smelyanskaya, reported that LJ itself is currently blocking Navalny's blog, since he has been excluded from the register of banned sites. This statement of the representative of Roskomnadzor should be understood as not only state organizations, but also LiveJournal itself. After all, none of the state bodies announced the possibility of ending the blocking. Currently, the entries that cause claims from the Prosecutor General's Office have been removed from the blog, but the blog is still being blocked.

Poster theft case

Employees of the Anti-Corruption Foundation Georgy Alburov and Nikita Kulachenkov were summoned to the Investigative Committee to be charged under Art. 158 part 2 paragraphs "a" and "c" (theft by a group of persons by prior agreement with causing significant damage).

FBK employees are accused of stealing the painting "Good and Bad Man" by artist Sergei Sotov, which hung on a fence in Vladimir. After the painting was presented to Navalny for his birthday, the investigators seized it and opened a theft case.

Sociological survey data

According to a poll conducted by the Levada Center in April 2011, only 6% of Russians knew about Navalny. Of those who knew Navalny, 5% were "definitely" ready to vote for him in the presidential elections in Russia, 28% - "maybe", 37% would rather not vote, and 19% would definitely not support Navalny in the presidential elections. At the same time, 68% trusted his reports of corruption and considered them reliable (33% “definitely believed” and 35% “rather believed”), 23% did not trust (19% - “the information from Navalny, most likely, did not correspond to reality” and 4% “definitely did not believe RosPil”). The percentage of trust was higher among Muscovites (88%), wealthy people (79%) and among people under the age of 24 (76%). According to a poll conducted by the Levada Center in March 2012, 25% of Russians already knew about Navalny. A year later, in a Levada Center poll, 34% knew him, and 14% were ready to support him in the presidential election.

According to a poll conducted by the Levada Center in January 2015, the attitude of Russians towards Navalny has deteriorated significantly. If in 2013 in one way or another 30% had a positive attitude, and 20% had a negative one, then in 2015 this ratio became the opposite - 17% and 37%.

Criticism

Director of the Effective Policy Foundation Gleb Pavlovsky expressed the opinion that Navalny's goal is to create a "political project" with the formation of a certain "electoral sector" with the aim of its further transfer on certain conditions to one of the opposition parties or movements. Pavlovsky believes that the idea of creating such a social populist project was taken in the West, comparing, in particular, Navalny's activities with the "Tea Movement" in the United States.

Navalny has been repeatedly criticized by the liberal opposition for his nationalist views.

In turn, Navalny spoke in 2007 that the liberals have a totalitarian mindset, a policy of double standards, and that therefore the then regime was better for the country than the opposition coming to power. But he also considered the new generation of bureaucrats, who are trying to replace their predecessors, to be unprincipled "managers" - much worse than both the party nomenklatura and the current "Komsomol members".

Mikhail Delyagin believed that the Kirovles case and the release of Navalny on July 19, 2013 showed that at the time Navalny, not Putin, was the true, albeit informal, leader of the ruling bureaucracy. Delyagin drew a parallel between Navalny and Yeltsin before he came to power. According to Delyagin, Navalny's coming to power will mean a liberal dictatorship like Augusto Pinochet.

But because of the position taken by Navalny on the conflict in Ukraine, Zakhar Prilepin currently considers him only a former friend and ally and a fringe politician.

According to Communist Party leader Zyuganov, speaking about the 2013 mayoral elections in Moscow, "Navalny sat with Saakashvili on the same bench, trained in America how to fool Russian citizens."

Positive Opinions

Former Minister of Economy of Russia, scientific director of the Higher School of Economics Yevgeny Yasin said that he considers "Navalny's activities useful for the development of the Russian economy and society."

Sociologist Igor Eidman called Alexei Navalny a people's political leader and, in his opinion, “Navalny was believed by many of those who did not believe anyone for many years. His personal challenge to the system has already received the support of thousands of people.”

The media compare Navalny with Julian Assange, and RosPil with WikiLeaks. In 2011 the magazine foreign policy included Navalny at number 24 in the list of the 100 best "global thinkers" (Eng. The FP Top 100 Global Thinkers) for leading the campaign to improve the transparency of the Russian government and, in particular, for the opening of the RosPeel project.

On October 22, 2012, in the elections of the Coordinating Council of the Russian Opposition on the general civil list, he took first place, gaining 43.7 thousand votes.

Prizes and awards

Alexei Navalny was recognized by the Vedomosti newspaper as the person of the year 2009.
According to the results of 2009, Alexei Navalny became the laureate of the fifth annual award of the Finance magazine in the nomination "For the Protection of the Rights of Minority Shareholders".
In October 2010, after the removal of Yuri Luzhkov from the post of mayor of Moscow, he was declared the winner in the "virtual election of the mayor of Moscow" organized by the Kommersant newspaper.
He was included by the editors of the site Openspace.ru in the list of "Heroes of 2010" "for working behind enemy lines" and took first place in the voting of site visitors.
Alexei Navalny's blog on LiveJournal won the Best Blog of a Politician or Public Activist nomination, and the entry in this blog, How They Saw in Transneft, won the Best Investigative Blog nomination of the Runet Blog 2011 contest.
The RosPil project received the award of The BOBs International Competition of Blogs and Online Communities in the nomination "The most useful resource for society", the award was awarded by both Internet users and the international jury.
At the end of 2011, the British newspaper Financial Times put Navalny at the top of the list of "25 Russians representing the 'driving force' of Russia."
At the same time, Kommersant Vlast magazine put Navalny in fifth place in the ranking of the world popularity of Russian citizens, compiled on the basis of their mention in foreign media in the fourth quarter of 2011.
In December 2011, the Vedomosti newspaper named Navalny "Politician of the Year".
In early 2012, in an online survey conducted by the magazine Time, Navalny became the sixth in the TIME 100 rating. At the same time, he was the only Russian to be included by the magazine in the ranking of the 100 most influential people in the world.

Alexey Navalny - photo

The Russian opposition, as a kind of generalized social movement, suffers from a number of systemic vices. Disunity, ambiguous assessments of emerging situations and their changes, the difference in political platforms and goals - this is an incomplete list of factors that form the weakness of the influence of forces that oppose the existing government, which, nevertheless, all their leaders characterize as "criminal" and "bloody". At the end of the first decade of the 21st century, a new figure appeared on the Russian political scene - Navalny. Who is this, what are the ambitions of this figure and why exactly did he decide to lead the opposition movement? What are its goals, what does it call for? Polls conducted in Russia showed that half of the country's population does not even know who it is. It's time to fill this gap.

Opposition constructive and destructive

In modern Russia, protest moods have a certain social basis, as in any other country. Not a single state has yet been able to create an ideal society, there are dissatisfied people everywhere, and it is the opposition that always strives to use unfavorable factors. In essence, this is its political role, criticism of shortcomings, even very angry, contributes to the improvement of the work of state structures. Several other goals were pursued by the opposition, which set themselves destructive goals. For example, the Bolshevik Party during the First World War tried in every possible way to weaken the state and destroy its foundations. All means were suitable for this, including undermining the defense capability, using money received from the enemy, and direct sabotage. Each state, even positioning itself as the most democratic, has the right to fight against the forces seeking to destroy it. Moreover, it is his duty to society. So what are the goals of the political movement he leads in modern Russia, Alexei Navalny? Who supports and finances?

Early Russian opposition

The history of the emergence of the modern Russian opposition begins at the very end of the 80s. Most of its representatives sincerely fought against the communist regime, were in prison, served exile and proudly called themselves dissidents. Even then, it was divided into “wings” - left and right, but, regardless of orientation, it joyfully welcomed the coming to power of democratic forces led by B. N. Yeltsin. Far from all oppositionists fully corresponded to the image of a zealot of people's aspirations, which is why the first problems arose. In the expanses of the former USSR, meanwhile, a struggle for souls and power unfolded. Presidents and prime ministers in the post-Soviet countries were people who had been trained in the United States (this biographical fact was perceived quite positively by the population at that time). Personnel known to be friendly to the West were also trained for Russia. Judging by the support provided, M. Kasyanov, B. Nemtsov or G. Yavlinsky were considered the best representatives of a set of promising democratic-liberal leaders in the United States.

Appearance

Opposition figures like G. Novodvorskaya, and even the famous chess player G. Kasparov were not considered as promising political figures, their images did not correspond to the depth of the task. But the solid and experienced leaders of the Yeltsin era, proven and loyal to the West, were also not suitable. The fact that they were already in power, and more recently, spoke eloquently against them. Politicians and economists of the Yeltsin recruitment did not bring anything good to the people, and this has not yet been forgotten. Reboot required. A new leader was needed who would be able to unite the disparate opposition forces, would have a certain charisma, high intelligence, a sarcastic-ironic mindset and could speak beautifully, in other words, would own the audience. At the same time, such a person, ideally, should actually be deprived of the past. And such a candidate was found, his name was Alexei Navalny. Who it was, no one knew. Just a blogger. But

Opposition family

Parents of Alexei Anatolyevich are ordinary people. Father is a communications officer, a graduate of the Kyiv Military School. Mother studied at the Ordzhonikidze Department). Born in 1976, the son of a military man and future opposition leader often changed cities and schools. At present, the parents own a small enterprise engaged in the manufacture of wicker products. Alexei also has a younger brother, Oleg, who was born in 1984, but more about him later. Wife - Yulia Borisovna. There are two children, Daria (born in 2001) and Zakhar (born in 2008). In short, a family is like a family. Alexei Navalny lives in Maryino (a Moscow district that is not particularly prestigious). Modesty adorns a politician, especially a young one.

Studies

After graduating from the Alabinsky school at the military camp, the young man entered the law faculty from which he graduated in 1998. Alexei Navalny managed to work in a bank, and a year before graduation, he showed a craving for commerce, becoming the founder of the Nesna society (hairdresser's). Things did not work out, the company was sold, but the search for a better life continued. The young man received a second higher education at the Financial Academy under the Government of the Russian Federation at the Faculty of Finance and Credit, becoming a specialist in stock exchange and securities. The craving for learning manifested itself again, in 2010, when he managed to complete a six-month course (the Yale World Fellows grant program) in the USA at Yale University. The venerable Russian oppositionists E. Albats, O. Tsyvinsky, S. Guriev and G. Kasparov gave a recommendation to the beginning politician. They were known in America, they listened to their words.

labor path

Allekt LLC was registered in 1997 as an agent of the opposition Union of Right Forces. It was engaged in advertising, its activities were not very successful, despite the fact that the "Right Forces" paid for its services in the amount of almost one hundred million rubles, of which Navalny received five percent as a reward from the deputy director. Who will consider this a violation of the law or financial discipline? Currently LLC "Allekt" is liquidated. The same fate befell the law firm “N. N. Securities, co-founded by Aleksey Anatolyevich and his friends from law school. Since 2001, Eurasian Transport Systems LLC, in the creation of which Navalny took part, has been providing logistics and transport services. The company also self-liquidated. In 2009, he became a lawyer, having passed an exam in the city of Kirov, and even held two trials. In the same period, Navalny and Partners did not exist for long. In 2012, he was promoted to a responsible position in Aeroflot by A. Lebedev, who owns NRB Bank. When elected, the protégé promised to wage an uncompromising fight against corruption. A year later, Navalny Alexei Anatolyevich left this post, apparently not of his own free will.

The beginning of big politics

Showing great energy in the field of business, Alexei Anatolyevich was engaged in active political activity. The fight against corruption is a win-win business, it can be done endlessly, and it is very difficult to evaluate the effectiveness. Since 2004, the “Committee for the Protection of Muscovites” has been doing this difficult socially useful work. Since 2005, care for young people has been added to it (the “Yes!” Movement) and the leadership of the “Police with the People” movement. The political career began in cooperation with the Governor of the Kirov region N. Belykh (non-staff adviser) and the Foundation for Support of His Initiatives.

Then there was Yabloko (a member of the political council) and the post of head of the Moscow party organization. In 2007, Alexei Anatolyevich Navalny was expelled from the party with a scandal for extreme nationalism. He himself explained this incident by his confrontation with Yavlinsky.

Nationalism

The national idea is almost as advantageous as especially when combined with democratic slogans. In Moscow, from time to time, this or that carefully orchestrated "Russian" march took place. Navalny could be seen on almost every one of them. However, by 2013, excessive scandalousness (jigging, raging young people and other hooligans created an unfavorable background) prompted the politician to temporarily refuse to participate in nationalist mass events. Criticism of the “Putin regime” became the main activity of the “People” movement, which, however, turned out to be not as numerous as its creators wanted. Navalny, whose photo has already been published by almost all the media, tried to unite his organization to the Other Russia, but was rejected. Nevertheless, the image of an uncompromising fighter against corruption has already taken root; in the elections of the capital's mayor, the opposition candidate came out on the "silver". But then the Yves Rocher case suddenly arose, significantly spoiling the heroic image.

Fraternal help

Oleg Navalny, the brother of the oppositionist, worked as an automation specialist and head of the domestic mail department at the Russian Post, and then decided to start his own business and quit in 2013. It was he who was able to convince the representatives of the Yves Rocher company not to use the services of the public service anymore (and it, obviously, really did not work in the best way), but to entrust their shipments and receipts to the private company GPA, which actually belongs to his own brother. The price, of course, turned out to be higher, but reliability ... So, at least, Oleg Navalny claimed. And won the favor of foreigners. In fact, no one was going to carry letters, parcels and parcels. Receiving the cargo for shipment, the Navalny brothers entrusted the troublesome business to other transport companies, which charge much less for services. For some time this simple scheme functioned successfully, but sooner or later everything secret becomes clear. Either the deadlines were not met, or something was missing, but the French suspected something was wrong. Then they made a claim and rolled. In total, the Navalny brothers cheated their clients by 24 million. The case went to court and received international publicity. Immediately, protests began in connection with the oppression of the opposition in Russia.

Punishment

The verdict of the court cannot be called too strict. In Soviet times, they could easily be shot for this, and even the faithful "ten" shone even in Gorbachev's rule, when almost everything was possible. Oleg Navalny received a real term of 3.5 years, while his brother, an anti-corruption oppositionist and champion of honesty, got off with a suspended sentence. The court, apparently, took into account his merits in the fight against theft. The accomplices will also have to pay a fine of 4,800,000 rubles. It must be understood that such a trifle will not be the case.

Reaction to the case

Of course, the liberal public is still trying to convince the population of Russia that Navalny suffered precisely for the fight against the regime. The rally followed the rally during the consideration of the court case, then the activity decreased, but it has not reached zero today. The image of the victim has always evoked massive sympathy in our country, moreover, many of the statements of the disgraced politician evoke a lively response in the hearts of people. Indeed, not everything is in order in Russia with migration legislation, and there are enough other problems.

Who is guilty?

The Navalny case is being hyped up by the pro-Western and liberal media, it is called a fabrication, but the participation of a deceived foreign defendant in it significantly undermines the position of defenders of civil liberties.

There is nothing sweeter for the leader of the Russian opposition than the feeling of sacrifice combined with defiance. It was in this direction that Alexei Navalny showed emotions. A photo of an electronic bracelet defiantly cut by him spread around the Internet in early 2014 after the suspended sentence took effect and the need for house arrest disappeared. For some reason, they did not manage to remove this device in time - and here it is, a reason for protest. The reaction of the "satraps", however, did not follow.

Another reason to appear on television was the murder of Boris Nemtsov. Many leaders of the "movement of dissent" reacted to this tragic event, including K. Sobchak and A. Navalny. The rally, planned for the next day, actually became a failure. The oppositionist habitually places the blame for Nemtsov's death on Putin.

He himself believes that he will be able to govern the country much more successfully after winning the next presidential election.