Kremlin Opponent Aleksei Navalny Is Briefly Detained for Organizing Protests<br />22, 2018<br />MOSCOW — A prominent Russian opposition leader, Aleksei A. Navalny, said he was briefly detained by the police<br />on Thursday as the authorities initiated legal proceedings against him for organizing illegal protests.<br />Mr. Navalny also organized large-scale protests in June and in March,<br />but he could not fully take part in them because the police detained him each time.<br />Mr. Navalny said on Twitter that he had been detained by seven police officers as he left a dental clinic and<br />that he had been released after being informed of the proceedings against him.<br />The legal maneuvering was widely interpreted as a precautionary measure, intended to ensure<br />that Mr. Navalny could be safely tucked away, if need be, in the prelude to the Russian presidential election on March 18.<br />"I don’t understand what happened and why seven people detained me." Over the past decade, Mr. Navalny, 41, became Russia’s pre-eminent opposition figure by exposing corruption<br />and the lavish lifestyles of members of Mr. Putin’s inner circle.<br />Separately, Mr. Navalny’s campaign chief, Leonid Volkov, was detained at Sheremetyevo<br />International Airport near Moscow on Thursday and held at a police station.
