Alexei Anatolievich Navalny, born on June 4, 1976, is a prominent Russian opposition leader, lawyer, and anti-corruption activist. He has organized anti-government demonstrations and run for office to advocate for reforms against corruption in Russia, and against President Vladimir Putin and his government. Putin avoids referring to Navalny directly by name. Navalny was a member of the Russian Opposition Coordination Council, and he is the leader of the Russia of the Future party as well as the founder of the Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK)​. By 2021, Navalny had more than six million YouTube subscribers, and he used his social media channels to publish material about corruption in Russia, organize political demonstrations, and promote his campaigns. He described Russia's ruling party, United Russia, as a "party of crooks and thieves" in a 2011 radio interview, a phrase that became a popular epithet. Navalny and the FBK have published investigations detailing alleged corruption by high-ranking Russian officials and their associate​. ## Fake charges and a mayoral "election" In 2013, Navalny received a suspended sentence for embezzlement but was still allowed to run in the 2013 Moscow mayoral election. He came in second, gaining 27% of the vote, which outperformed expectations, but he lost to the incumbent mayor Sergey Sobyanin, who was a Putin appointee. In 2014, Navalny received another suspended sentence for embezzlement. Both of these criminal cases were widely considered to be politically motivated, intended to bar him from running in future elections. These cases were ruled by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) to have violated Navalny's right to a fair trial, but his sentences were never overturned​. In 2017, the documentary "He Is Not Dimon to You" was released, which accused Dmitry Medvedev, the then Prime Minister and previous President, of corruption. This led to mass protests. In 2018, Navalny initiated Smart Voting, a tactical voting strategy intended to consolidate the votes of those who oppose United Russia​. ## Novichok poisoning In August 2020, Navalny was hospitalized in serious condition after being poisoned with a Novichok nerve agent. He was medically evacuated to Berlin and discharged a month later. Navalny accused Putin of being responsible for his poisoning, and an investigation implicated agents from the Federal Security Service (FSB). In January 2021, Navalny returned to Russia and was immediately detained on accusations of violating parole conditions while he was hospitalized in Germany, which were imposed as a result of his 2014 conviction​. Following his arrest and the release of the documentary "Putin's Palace", which accused Putin of corruption, mass protests were held across Russia. In February 2021, Navalny's suspended sentence was replaced with a prison sentence of over two and a half years' detention​. His organizations, including the FBK, were later designated as extremist and liquidated. In March 2022, Navalny was sentenced to an additional nine years in prison after being found guilty of embezzlement and contempt of court in a new trial described as a sham by Amnesty International. His appeal was rejected and in June 2023, he was transferred to a high-security prison. In August, 2023, [Navalny was given and absurd additional 19 years in prison](https://www.cnn.com/2023/08/04/europe/navalny-extremism-trial-verdict-russia-intl/index.html). He made a statement to the effect of understanding his tenure in a high-security penal colony to be effectively a life sentence -- until the end of his life, or the life of Putin's regime.