Navalny’s former chief of employees Leonid Volkov attacked with hammer exterior his Lithuania house

Leonid Volkov, the longtime chief of employees of the late Russian opposition chief Alexei Navalny, was attacked with a hammer and tear gasoline exterior his house Tuesday, Navalny’s spokesperson Kira Yarmysh stated. Volkov has lived in Lithuania in self-imposed exile from Russia for a minimum of 4 years.

The reported assault comes lower than a month after the loss of life of Navalny in a Russian jail colony.

“Somebody broke a automotive window and sprayed tear gasoline in his eyes, after which the attacker began hitting Leonid with a hammer,” Yarmysh wrote late Tuesday on X. “Leonid is now at house, police and ambulance are on their technique to him.”

Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Basis, of which Volkov as soon as served as chairman, posted pictures on X of Volkov with a bloodied leg and swollen face. The group additionally posted a photograph of a automotive’s smashed window. His affiliate Ivan Zhdanov posted pictures of Volkov being introduced into an ambulance on a gurney.

For a lot of younger Russians, goals of democracy died with Alexei Navalny

Volkov was Navalny’s longtime high political adviser and helped run Navalny’s campaigns. He fled Russia below menace of persecution and has confronted numerous expenses introduced towards him in Russia. In 2021, a Moscow courtroom ordered his arrest for encouraging minors to take part in unauthorized rallies — in what Lithuanian Inside Minister Agne Bilotaite condemned as “politically motivated prosecution,” based on VOA Information.

Volkov has additionally served as chairman of the Anti-Corruption Basis, which Navalny based in 2011 to examine alleged corruption by high-ranking Russian officers, more and more together with these inside the Kremlin elite. The inspiration was outlawed by Russia. Navalny was jailed in 2021 and, in August, a Russian courtroom handed him a 19-year sentence on extremism expenses. He died abruptly on Feb. 16 whereas in an Arctic penal colony.

For Russian political prisoners, Navalny’s loss of life is reminder of peril

Russia’s crackdown on dissent has been increasing for years, and political circumstances have snowballed because the nation invaded Ukraine. Russian President Vladimir Putin has criminalized antiwar protest and has suppressed conflict critics, political dissenters and unbiased journalism.

Lithuanian Overseas Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis stated that related authorities are engaged on Volkov’s case. “Information about Leonid’s assault are surprising,” Landsbergis wrote on X. “Perpetrators should reply for his or her crime.”