MOTION FOR A RESOLUTION on the arrest of Alexei Navalny

B9‑0091/2021

European Parliament resolution on the arrest of Alexei Navalny

(2021/2513(RSP))

The European Parliament,

– having regard to the European Court of Human Rights Grand Chamber ruling of 15 November 2018 in the case of Navalny v. Russia (application no. 29580/12 and four others), which outlined the applicant’s complaint that his arrest, detention and administrative conviction on seven occasions in 2012 and 2014 had breached his rights and had been politically motivated (ECHR 390 (2018)),

– having regard to Rule 132(2) of its Rules of Procedure,

A. whereas Mr Navalny, a Russian opposition politician, was the victim of an attack with a chemical nerve agent belonging to the Novichok group, a substance that has been added to the prohibited agents under the Chemical Weapons Convention; whereas he was poisoned on the Russian territory and transferred, with the consent of the Russian authorities, to a German hospital;

B. whereas after spending nearly five months in Germany while recovering from being poisoned, Mr Navalny was detained upon his arrival in Moscow on 17 January 2021; whereas since 29 December 2020, Mr Navalny has been on Russia’s wanted list for violating the terms of his probation whereas the Khimki court in Moscow Region ordered the arrest of Russian politician Alexei Navalny for 30 days;

C. whereas the European Court of Human Rights ruled that the seven episodes of Navalny’s arrest between 2012 and 2014 violated his rights and appeared to be part of a broader effort ‘to bring the opposition under control’; whereas the court called on Russia to extend greater legal rights to people protesting peacefully;

D. whereas around 70 people, including journalists and several high-profile supporters of Alexei Navalny, have been detained in connection to their reporting of, and support for, Mr Navalny upon his return to Russia;

E. whereas the Russian Federation, as a member of the Council of Europe and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, has committed to respecting fundamental freedoms, human rights and the rule of law as enshrined in the European Convention on Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights;

1. Expresses its deep concern at the detention of Alexei Navalny, demands his immediate release and calls on the Russian authorities to ensure his safety;

2. Calls on the Russian authorities to implement the ruling of the European Court of Human Rights and to drop the charges against Mr Navalny;

3. Calls for the release of those arrested for participating in the welcoming of Mr Navalny at Moscow’s Vnukovo airport;

4. Reiterates its call on the Russian authorities to investigate the attack on Alexei Navalny’s life in full transparency and without further delay and to cooperate with the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons when it comes to establishing international knowledge about international research programmes into next-generation nerve agents such as Novichok 2.0, and to break its international silence on these biochemical weapons; calls, furthermore, for those responsible to be brought to justice, regardless of their political and economic status; is concerned at the number of cases of poisoning, or other forms of targeted assassination, of current and former Russian citizens, either within Russia itself or on foreign soil over the last two decades; stresses that the failure to hold perpetrators accountable and provide justice for the victims and their families is hard to explain or justify; calls on Russia to immediately end impunity for such cases and to guarantee the security of its citizens;

5. Supports the work carried out by anticorruption activists and Russian civil society to investigate, document and expose the corruption of high-ranking government officials, whose activities run counter to the interests of the Russian State and its people;

6. Reiterates its concern at the shrinking space of the extra-parliamentary opposition and civil society in Russia; calls on the Russian authorities to ensure that Russian citizens are able to carry out their legitimate and useful activities without any interference and without fearing for their lives or for those of their family members and friends;

7. Expresses its deep concern that the arrest of Mr Navalny has added to the already high tensions between Russia and the EU; stresses that the current confrontation between Russia and the EU is not in the interests of the two partners, their citizens or their economies; underlines that concrete efforts need to be made to overcome the renewed confrontational division of the European continent; stresses that the only option to preserve the security and well-being of the people on both sides is to resolve the differences through dialogue and negotiation;

8. Underlines that EU-Russian interparliamentary dialogue is not a reward, but an instrument to raise concerns, to exchange arguments and to promote mutual understanding and trust; notes that Parliament uses this instrument  when it is dealing with parties with whom deep differences persist; notes that inter-parliamentary relations with the Russian Duma have been frozen for more than 6 years and takes the view that this lack of dialogue has contributed to the deepening mutual mistrust; calls for the normal functioning of the interparliamentary dialogue between the Russian Duma and Parliament to be restored:

9. Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Council, the Commission, the Vice-President of the Commission / High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, and the Government and Parliament of the Russian Federation.