A Moscow court sent Alexey Navalny to prison for two and a half years on Tuesday, closing a heated hearing in which the Kremlin critic ridiculed claims he broke his parole conditions while in a coma and denounced Russia's leader as "Putin the poisoner." The decision is likely to inflame anger among Navalny's supporters, as tens of thousands of Russians have turned out for protests over the past two weekends, many demanding the activist's release. His allies had already called for another round of nationwide demonstrations this weekend. Navalny was detained two weeks ago upon his return to Moscow from Berlin, accused of failing to meet his parole terms under a 2014 suspended sentence for embezzlement — a case he has dismissed as politically motivated. Navalny had been handed a three-and-a-half-year suspended sentence in the 2014 case along with five years of probation. The court on Tuesday ruled that he violated the terms of his probation and order his suspended sentence to be replaced with a prison term. The judge took into account the 11 months Navalny had already spent under house arrest as part of its decision. A perennial thorn in President Vladimir Putin's side, Navalny had spent five months in Germany recovering from Novichok poisoning before his return to Moscow on Jan. 17. He has blamed the attack on Russian security services and Putin himself, accusations that the Kremlin has repeatedly denied. Navalny has been arrested and detained several times but had until now avoided lengthy sentences. While Navalny was recovering in Germany, Russian authorities had repeatedly threatened to jail him if he returned home. Navalny's lawyers previously said they had little hope for his release and criticized the Kremlin's control of the country's courts. As he listened to the judge read out a lengthy verdict, Navalny drew a heart on the glass box he was confined in for his wife, Yulia Navalnya, who stood near him. Earlier, he had ridiculed allegations that he could have better-informed parole officers of his whereabouts while comatose, repeatedly being told by the judge to stop speaking and to the objections of prosecutors. "Can you explain to me how else I was supposed to fulfill the terms of my probation and notify where I am?" he said from his glass enclosure. A prison service representative responded by asking why he had not provided documents to explain the serious reasons that prevented him from showing up for inspections. "Coma?" Navalny shot back. "Why are you sitting here and telling the court you didn't know where I was? I fell into a coma, then I was in the ICU, then in rehabilitation. I contacted my lawyer to send you a notice. You had the address, my contact details. What else could I have done to inform you?" he said. "The president of our country said live on air he let me go to get treatment in Germany and you didn't know that too?" In a separate outburst, Navalny described Putin as a "little thieving man in his bunker" who "doesn't want me to set foot on the ground in Russia." "The reason for this is the hatred and fear of one person who is hiding in the bunker. I've offended him so deeply by the fact that I've survived," Navalny charged. When a prosecutor tried to object, Navalny snapped back: "I don't need your objections." "He can pretend he is this big politician, the world leader, but now my main offense to him is that he will go down in history as Putin the Poisoner. There was Alexander the Liberator and Yaroslav the Wise, and there will be Vladimir the Poisoner of Underpants," Navalny added. "He is not engaging in geopolitics, he holds meetings on how to smear underwear with chemical weapons." — Agencies
