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Russian authorities have zealously prosecuted people with links to Aleksei A. Navalny’s organization inside Russia in the year since he died.
Feb. 15, 2025, 5:01 a.m. ET
Six months after the opposition leader Aleksei A. Navalny died in a Russian prison above the Arctic Circle, Konstantin A. Kotov woke up to find his Moscow apartment under siege.
After breaking down the door, Russian officers set about confiscating everything to do with Mr. Navalny, down to a campaign button from the activist’s 2018 presidential run and a book written by his brother. Then, they arrested Mr. Kotov and took him away.
His alleged crime: donating approximately $30 three years earlier to Mr. Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Fund, which the Kremlin considers an extremist group.
The death one year ago of Mr. Navalny, who once led tens of thousands of Russians against the Kremlin on the streets of Moscow, dealt a serious blow to Russia’s already beleaguered opposition. Much of that movement has fled abroad amid a crackdown on dissent that began before President Vladimir V. Putin’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, but escalated with the war.
Even with Mr. Navalny dead and his movement in tatters, the authorities have been going after people with links to him and his organization inside Russia. Some see the continued prosecutions as a repressive Russian machine operating on autopilot. Others see a Moscow that views the opposition figure’s legacy as an enduring threat.
“They seem to be doing it more out of habit, rather than as a new campaign,” said Sergei S. Smirnov, the editor in chief of the exiled media outlet Mediazona.
