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Alexei Navalny’s Mother Files Lawsuit with Russian Court Demanding Release of Her Son’s Body 

Flowers are seen placed around portraits of late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in a Russian Arctic prison, at a makeshift memorial in front of the former Russian consulate in Frankfurt am Main, western Germany, on February 20, 2024. (AFP)
Flowers are seen placed around portraits of late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in a Russian Arctic prison, at a makeshift memorial in front of the former Russian consulate in Frankfurt am Main, western Germany, on February 20, 2024. (AFP)
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Alexei Navalny’s Mother Files Lawsuit with Russian Court Demanding Release of Her Son’s Body 

Flowers are seen placed around portraits of late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in a Russian Arctic prison, at a makeshift memorial in front of the former Russian consulate in Frankfurt am Main, western Germany, on February 20, 2024. (AFP)
Flowers are seen placed around portraits of late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in a Russian Arctic prison, at a makeshift memorial in front of the former Russian consulate in Frankfurt am Main, western Germany, on February 20, 2024. (AFP)

The mother of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny has filed a lawsuit at a court in the Arctic city of Salekhard contesting officials’ refusal to release her son’s body, Russia’s state news agency Tass reported Wednesday.

A closed-door hearing has been scheduled for March 4, the report said, quoting court officials.

Lyudmila Navalnaya has been trying to retrieve her son’s body since Saturday, following his death in a penal colony in Russia’s far north a day earlier. She has been unable to find out where his body is being held, Navalny’s team reported.

Navalnaya appealed to Russian President Vladimir Putin Tuesday to release her son’s remains so that she could bury him with dignity.

“For the fifth day, I have been unable to see him. They wouldn’t release his body to me. And they’re not even telling me where he is,” a black-clad Navalnaya, 69, said in the video, with the barbed wire of Penal Colony No. 3 in Kharp, about 1,900 kilometers (1,200 miles) northeast of Moscow.

“I’m reaching out to you, Vladimir Putin. The resolution of this matter depends solely on you. Let me finally see my son. I demand that Alexei’s body is released immediately, so that I can bury him like a human being,” she said in the video, which was posted to social media by Navalny’s team.

Russian authorities have said the cause of Navalny’s death is still unknown and refused to release his body for the next two weeks as the preliminary inquest continues, members of Navalny's team said.

They accused the government of stalling to try to hide evidence. On Monday, Navalny’s widow, Yulia, released a video accusing Putin of killing her husband and alleged the refusal to release his body was part of a cover-up.

“They are cowardly and meanly hiding his body, refusing to give it to his mother and lying miserably,” she said.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov rejected the allegations of a cover-up, telling reporters that “these are absolutely unfounded, insolent accusations about the head of the Russian state.”

Navalny’s death has deprived the Russian opposition of its best-known and inspiring politician less than a month before an election that is all but certain to give Putin another six years in power.

Since Navalny’s death, about 400 people have been detained across in Russia as they tried to pay tribute to him with flowers and candles, according to OVD-Info, a group that monitors political arrests.

Authorities cordoned off some of the memorials to victims of Soviet repression across the country that were being used as sites to leave makeshift tributes to Navalny. Police removed the flowers at night, but more keep appearing.

Peskov said police were acting “in accordance with the law” by detaining people paying tribute to Navalny.

Over 60,000 people have submitted requests to the government asking for Navalny’s remains to be handed over to his relatives, OVD-Info said.

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Russia Says it Thwarted Ukrainian Charge to Expand its Incursion

In this photo released by the Russian Defense Ministry Press Service on Friday, June 21, 2024, Russian soldiers fire an anti-aircraft gun at an undisclosed location in Ukraine. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)
In this photo released by the Russian Defense Ministry Press Service on Friday, June 21, 2024, Russian soldiers fire an anti-aircraft gun at an undisclosed location in Ukraine. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)
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Russia Says it Thwarted Ukrainian Charge to Expand its Incursion

In this photo released by the Russian Defense Ministry Press Service on Friday, June 21, 2024, Russian soldiers fire an anti-aircraft gun at an undisclosed location in Ukraine. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)
In this photo released by the Russian Defense Ministry Press Service on Friday, June 21, 2024, Russian soldiers fire an anti-aircraft gun at an undisclosed location in Ukraine. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)

The Russian Defense Ministry said Tuesday that its forces checked an effort by Kyiv’s troops to expand a stunning weeklong incursion into Russia's Kursk region, as a Ukrainian Foreign Ministry official said Kyiv has no intention of occupying Russian territory in the major operation that has been shrouded in secrecy.

Russian army units, fresh reserves, army aircraft, drone teams and artillery forces stopped Ukrainian armored mobile groups from moving deeper into Russia, near the Kursk settlements of Obshchy Kolodez, Snagost, Kauchuk and Alexeyevsky, a Russian Defense Ministry statement said, The AP news.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesman Heorhii Tykhyi said the cross-border operation was aimed at protecting Ukrainian land from long-range strikes launched from Kursk.

“Ukraine is not interested in taking the territory of the Kursk region, but we want to protect the lives of our people,” Tykhyi was quoted as saying by local media.

He said that Russia had launched more than 2,000 strikes from the Kursk region in recent months using anti-aircraft missiles, barrel artillery, mortars, drones, 255 glide bombs and more than 100 missiles.

He said "the purpose of this operation is to preserve the lives of our children, to protect the territory of Ukraine from Russian strikes.”

Ukraine’s Western partners have said the country has the right to defend itself, including by attacking across the border. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said Tuesday that he backed the Ukrainian operation, though he said Kyiv officials didn’t consult him about it beforehand.

“What the Russian troops, the Russian air force is doing inside Ukraine bears the hallmarks of genocide, inhumane crimes, and Ukraine has every right to wage war in such a way as to paralyze Russia in its aggressive intentions as effectively as possible,” Tusk said.

The Kremlin’s forces are intensifying their attacks in eastern Ukraine. Ukraine’s General Staff said Tuesday that over the previous 24 hours, Russian troops launched 52 assaults in the area of Pokrovsk, a town in Ukraine’s Donetsk region that is close to the front line. That's roughly double the number of daily attacks there a week ago.

Ukraine's undermanned army has been struggling to hold back the bigger and better-equipped Russian forces in Donetsk.

Ukraine’s charge onto Russian soil that began Aug. 6 has already encompassed about 1,000 square kilometers (386 square miles) of Russian territory, the Ukrainian military claims.

The goals of the swift advance into the Kursk region have been a closely-guarded military secret.

Analysts say a catalyst may also have been Ukraine’s desire to ease pressure on its front line by attempting to draw the Kremlin’s forces into defending Kursk and other border areas. If so, the increased pressure around Pokrovsk suggests Moscow didn’t take the bait.

Ukraine’s ambitious operation — the largest attack on Russia since World War II — has rattled the Kremlin. It compelled Russian President Vladimir Putin to convene a meeting on Monday with his top defense officials.

Apparently, Ukraine assembled thousands of troops — some Western analysts estimate up to 10,000-12,000 — on the border in recent weeks without Russia noticing or doing anything about it.

About 121,000 people have been evacuated from Kursk or have fled the areas affected by fighting on their own, Russian officials say. The Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, said it has seen geolocated footage indicating that Ukrainian forces advanced as much as 24 kilometers (15 miles) from the border.

The Russian Defense Ministry appeared to support that claim when it said Tuesday it had also blocked an attack by the units of the 82nd Air Assault Brigade of the Ukrainian armed forces towards Maryinka, which is about that distance from Ukraine.

Russian state television on Tuesday showed residents from evacuated areas lining up in buildings and on the street to receive food and water.

Volunteers were pictured distributing bags of aid, while officials from the country’s Ministry of Emergency Situations helped people, including children and older people, off buses.

“There is no light, no connection, no water. There is nothing. It’s as if everyone has flown to another planet, and you are left alone. And the birds stopped singing,” an older man called Mikhail told Russian state television. "Helicopters and planes fly over the yard and shells were flying. What could we do? We left everything behind.”

A motive behind Ukraine’s bold dive into Russia was to stir up unrest, according to Putin, but he said that effort would fail.

The successful border breach also was surprising because Ukraine has been short of manpower at the front as it waits for new brigades to complete training.

Dara Massicot, an analyst at the Carnegie Endowment, said that the Ukrainian breakthrough was a smart move because it exploited gaps between various Russian commands in Kursk: border guards, Ministry of Defense forces and Chechen units that have been fighting on Russia's side in the war.

Russian command and control is fractured in Kursk, Massicot said on X late Monday.

Ukraine’s Army General Staff announced Tuesday that it was establishing of a 20-kilometer (12-mile) restricted access zone along Russian-Ukrainian border in the northeastern Sumy region, which borders Kursk.

The measures were introduced because of the increasing intensity of combat in the area and the rising presence of Russian reconnaissance and sabotage units in the area, a statement said.