New Delhi

Jailed Kremlin-critic Alexei Navalny's team on Monday appealed Russians to take up civil obedience campaign to protest Russian invasion of Ukraine.

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"Putin declared war on Ukraine and is trying to make everyone think that Ukraine was attacked by Russia, that is, by all of us. But that's not right," the Navalny team wrote on its Twitter account.

"We must show that we do not support the war. We call on Russians to show civil disobedience. Do not be silent."

Also Read | Russian shelling in Ukraine's Kharkiv 'violates laws of war': European Union

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Navalny is most prominent of opposition leaders who fiercely criticises Russian President Vladimir Putin. He was jailed last year after returning to Germany post recovery from a poisoning attempt. Laboratory tests had revealed that it was Novichok, a Soviet-era nerve agent. Navalny had accused Putin of trying to kill him.

Russia denied carrying out such an attack.

Since then, authorities have clamped down even more tightly on his movement, and key figures have fled into exile after being designated by the authorities as "foreign agents".

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The OVD-Info group which monitors protests and arrests in Russia said 6,006 people had so far been arrested for anti-war demonstrations since Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb.27 in what Putin said was a special operation to demilitarise and "denazify" the country. Ukraine and the West have dismissed that justification as baseless propaganda.

(With inputs from agencies)