Navalny declared declared dead on anniversary of key Putin speech
The announcement Friday thatAlexei Navalny had died coincided with the 17th anniversary of a speech President Vladimir Putin delivered in Munich — a lecture many Kremlin watchers see as a declaration of war on the West.
The announcement Friday that Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny had died in prison coincided with the 17th anniversary of a speech President Vladimir Putin delivered in Munich — a lecture many Kremlin watchers see as a declaration of war on the West.
Was Navalny's death in a Siberian prison timed to coincide with the pivotal address at a high-profile annual security conference? Not out of the realm of possibility, experts said.
"It's possible," Daniel Fried, a former U.S. ambassador to Poland who is now a fellow at the Atlantic Council, a Washington think tank, told NBC News. "The premise that the announcement of Navalny’s death, as world leaders gather in Munich, is a signal of Putin’s contempt of the West is a plausible one."
Keir Giles, senior consulting fellow with the Russia and Eurasia program at Chatham House, a London-based think tank, echoed Fried.
Vladimir Putin, at the 2007 Conference on Security Policy in Munich.Johannes Simon / Getty Images file"If there’s any symbolism at all to the timing, it is simply an indication that Russia does not care," Giles said. "Russia places no value on its international reputation. And this has been a distinguishing feature of Russian state behavior since the strategic change of gear in September 2021."
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