Kasparov: Navalny will stay in jail if Putin is in power

The rejection by a Moscow judge of opposition leader Alexei Navalny’s appeal against detention is not surprising, the Russian democracy activist and former world chess champion, Garry Kasparov has said.

“Russia is a full-blown dictatorship and everybody knows that Putin wants Navalny in jail,” he told BBC World News.

During his appeal Mr Navalny told the judge that his detention was “all massively, demonstratively illegal".

Mr Navalny was arrested for not complying with a suspended sentence. His lawyers say that the authorities knew he was being treated in Berlin for a near-fatal nerve agent attack.

He has blamed state security agents working under President Vladimir Putin’s orders for the Novichok attack which nearly killed him. Investigative journalists working for Bellingcat have named Russian FSB agents suspected of the poisoning.

The Kremlin denies involvement and disputes the conclusion, by Western weapons experts, that Novichok was used.