Yulia Navalnaya has vowed to continue her late husband Alexei Navalny’s campaign for a “free Russia” and has urged followers to resist President Vladimir Putin more vehemently than ever.
What do we know about Yulia Navalnaya?
Her Family And Childhood
Yulia Navalnaya was born Yulia Abrosimova on June 24, 1976 in Moscow. Her father, Boris Abrosimov, was a physicist, while her mother worked for the government.
Yulia Navalnaya, a graduate of the elite Plekhanov Russian University of Economics, spent some time working at a Moscow bank.
Family Life with Alexei Navalny
She met her future spouse, a young lawyer, while on vacation in Turkey in 1998. He was intrigued by her ability to remember all of Russia’s present ministers by heart, the Sobesednik newspaper wrote in a 2020 article about the couple.
They married two years later, and Yulia Navalnaya became a stay-at-home mother to their two daughters, Daria (born in 2001) and Zakhar (born in 2008). She and Alexei Navalny were previously members of the liberal Yabloko party.
Supporting Her Husband
Yulia Navalnaya frequently joined her husband at rallies, on the campaign trail, and in court throughout his several trials.
She sat calmly behind him at his first serious criminal trial in Kirov in 2013, where he faced ten years in prison for allegedly stealing from a wood firm while working for Kirov’s leftist governor.
“These bastards will never see our tears,” she said after Alexei Navalny was handed a five-year sentence. He was unexpectedly released the next day following protests, and his sentence was later suspended.
Yulia Navalnaya supported her husband throughout his Moscow mayoral campaign in 2013, standing on stage in front of thousands of Muscovites to encourage them to vote for him.
Alex Navalny’s Poisoning
Yulia Navalnaya played a critical part in her husband’s transfer from Russia to a German hospital in August 2020, where he was treated for what Western laboratory tests revealed was a Siberian nerve agent poisoning attempt.
Yulia Navalnaya wrote a direct letter to the Kremlin, pleading for it to intercede and allow Alexei Navalny to leave Russia.
The Kremlin responded that it had not received an official request for Alexei Navalny’s transfer from his representatives, but that it had heard about the message from social networks.
Alexei Navalny’s doctors in Omsk repeatedly postponed his relocation, citing bad health. Two days after Alexei Navalny was hospitalized, a plane organized by a Germany-based NGO arrived to transport him to Berlin.
When asked if the government intervened to prevent Alexei Navalny from reaching Germany, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov responded, “That is the decision of the attending physician.”
Multiple arrests
Yulia Navalnaya has been arrested several times during rallies linked to her husband’s activism work.
She was imprisoned twice in January 2021 during Moscow rallies in favor of Alexei Navalny, who had been jailed upon his return to Russia. “Sorry for the low quality. “Very bad light in the paddy wagon,” she captioned a selfie on Instagram.
She was later fined 20,000 rubles($265) by a court.
Emotional Toll
Yulia Navalnaya struggled to deal with the government’s pressure on her husband at times. Alexei Navalny told Reuters in 2017, ahead of his 2018 presidential campaign, that security services were monitoring his wife and children, who were then 15 and nine.
“Cars are constantly passing by. I don’t even pay attention to it any more, but Yulia is really bothered by it,” Alexei Navalny said.
“The main feeling I had was that I shouldn’t relax, show weakness,” Yulia Navalnaya said in an interview conducted in Germany after her husband’s poisoning. “If I fall apart, everyone will fall apart.”
Future Plans
Yulia Navalnaya posted a video statement on Monday titled “I will continue the work of Alexei Navalny.” She is now living outside the nation and has stated that her goal is to “build a free Russia,” but she has yet to elaborate on her plans or specify where she would be based.