Russian authorities force Alexei Navalny to listen to Putin's same speech for 100 days

Imprisoned Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny claimed that he was forced by prison guards to listen to President Vladimir Putin's same speech for 100 days in a row.

Navalny passed a message through his lawyers in which he claimed that the state-of-the-nation speech of Putin was played outside his cell on loudspeaker every night for months.

A letter from the prison service of Russia, which was posted on the Instagram account of Navalny, said that the speech of Putin was important to ensure the opposition leader’s “respectful attitude to society, work, and the norms and rules of human behaviour”.

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47-year-old Navalny told a prison guard, “Are you not right in the head? Put on a different Putin [speech], hasn’t he given enough?” The prison guard, in reply, said that they will continue to play Putin’s address to parliament every day till he delivers the next one, which is scheduled for next year.

Putin's speech for'educational purposes'

Navalny added that when he complained about it to the officials, he was informed that the speech was being played outside his cell for “educational purposes”.

During a two-hour speech to parliament in February, Putin claimed how Kremlin was forced to invade Ukraine with the aim of thwarting a Western plot to “destroy” Russia. No evidence of his claim was provided by him.

Navalny, who has appealed to Russians to protest against the Russia-Ukraine war, is serving a prison sentence of 11 and a half years on fraud charges, which are seen as politically motivated by many. He is also facing an additional 30 years of imprisonment on extremism charges.

Navalny, a lawyer and anti-corruption activist, came to prominence after massive protests were led against Putin in 2011-12. Tens of millions of people have watched his online investigations into Kremlin corruption. In 2018, he was stopped from contesting for president's position and an assassination attempt was also made using a Soviet-era nerve agent in 2020.

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In May, Navalny had made the first complaint about Putin’s speeches being played throughout the penal colony at top volume. He called the practice “Putin torture”.

In a message shared on Telegram, Navalny wrote: “Often, the fragment [of the speech] where Putin says, ‘We didn’t start this war, it was them who started it and we’re trying to end it,’ sounds at the precise moment when I have just got into bed, pulled up the blanket to my chin and closed my eyes. Every time this happens, I give in and shake my head at the brazenness of this blatant lie. And then think to myself, ‘I did the right thing. It’s better to be in prison than put up with this kind of authority.’ And I fall asleep happy.”

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