(Warsaw) Russian opponent Yulia Navalnaïa, who is organizing an anti-war demonstration on Sunday in Berlin, admitted on Wednesday that she has no immediate “plan” to end Vladimir Putin's regime, but nevertheless believes in his fall.
Posted at 7:09 a.m.
The Russian opposition, exiled due to repression in Russia and weakened by internal conflicts, lost its figurehead in February 2024: the charismatic anti-corruption activist Alexei Navalny, husband of Yulia Navalnaïa, died in prison in murky circumstances.
Mme Navalnaya, 48, who took over the reins of the movement from her husband, admitted that “no one has any plans” within the opposition to end the invasion of Ukraine and the president's rule Vladimir Putin.
“If someone had a plan, we would surely have adopted it a long time ago and implemented it,” she said in an interview with Russian opposition television Dozhd.
“Everything is changing quickly and no one knows what we will have to adapt to or what will have to be resolved tomorrow,” she continued, believing that we must concentrate on daily acts of opposition to Vladimir Putin and the invasion of Ukraine.
She said that “there will be a plan, but […] that it will take a long time.” “We will absolutely win, we cannot let a murderer and a war criminal rule the country,” she added.
Three Russian opposition figures in exile, including Mme Navalnaïa, are organizing the first major anti-war and anti-Putin demonstration abroad in Berlin on Sunday, while tens of thousands of Russians have left their country since 2022.
“We have to do at least something so that the regime falls more quickly,” explained Mr.me Navalnaya, believing that it is important to show that “many people are against Putin and against the war”.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitri Peskov judged on Wednesday that Russian opponents were “monstrously and definitively detached from their country”. “Their opinion is of no importance,” he told the press.
In her interview with Dozhd media, Yulia Navalnaïa once again called for an immediate end to the invasion of Ukraine and the withdrawal of Russian troops.
However, she affirmed that she did not want the “defeat” of her country, but “the defeat of Vladimir Putin, as quickly as possible”.
