Alexei Navalny lay in an open casket in a Moscow church on Friday under a bed of roses, carnations and chrysanthemums, his face pale in candlelight, surrounded by grieving relatives and supporters. Despite appearances, it was anything but a normal funeral. His mother, Lyudmilla, in a black headscarf and sunglasses, had just returned from wresting his body from Russian investigators in the Arctic. And many of those closest to the late opposition leader were not there at all.
Absent was Navalny’s wife, Yulia, who has vowed to carry on her husband’s work, and can no longer be in Russia without risking charges of “extremism.” Her message of farewell was conveyed in an Instagram post, rather than in person. “Lyosha, thank you for 26 years of absolute happiness,” she wrote, and then alluding to his imprisonment: “Yes, even in the last three years of happiness.”
