Moscow, Russia:
A Moscow court on Saturday convicted best Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny of defamation, just hours soon after a further court upheld an order for him to serve more than two years in prison in a further case.
Judge Vera Akimova mentioned Navalny was guilty of defaming a World War II veteran who was amongst a group of Russians Navalny referred to as “traitors” for appearing in a pro-Kremlin video.
The verdict was nevertheless becoming study and a sentence not however imposed, an AFP journalist in the courtroom mentioned.
Prosecutors have asked for Navalny to be fined the equivalent of $13,000.
Before the judge started reading the verdict Navalny created jokes and spoke to reporters from inside his glass box.
“Why are you so sad?” he mentioned, adding he was attempting to make ice cream in jail and had currently created pickled cucumbers.
Earlier Saturday a further court upheld a ruling to jail 44-year-old Navalny, sealing his initially lengthy prison sentence soon after a decade of legal battles with Russian authorities.
Navalny was ordered on February 2 to serve the time in a penal colony for breaching his parole terms although he was in Germany recovering from a nerve agent poisoning he blames on the Kremlin.
Supporters of the outspoken opposition figure say the situations are a pretext to silence his corruption exposes and quash his political ambitions.
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