Reports emerged on Tuesday night that a close ally and top strategist of the late opposition leader Alexei Navalny was assaulted near his home in Lithuania's capital. The assailant allegedly smashed a window of the ally's car, sprayed tear gas into his eyes, and proceeded to hit him with a hammer. The incident occurred in Vilnius, nearly a month after Navalny's death in a remote Arctic penal colony where he was serving a 19-year prison term on politically motivated extremism charges.
Navalny, a prominent anti-corruption campaigner and Russia's leading opposition figure, had been imprisoned since January 2021 following his return to Moscow from Germany, where he was recovering from nerve agent poisoning that he attributed to the Kremlin. His Foundation for Fighting Corruption and network of regional offices were labeled as “extremist organizations” by the Russian government.
