Alexei Navalny latest news: Putin 'believes he is untouchable' as body still missing

A former Russian model turned activist has revealed she had to “inform” her children about what nerve agent poisoning is like in the wake of Alexei Navalny's death – and fears something will happen to her.

Ksenia Maksimova was helping Russians flee Putin's regime and is now based in the UK, fearing returning to her homeland because she would likely be arrested.

“I was told that I shouldn't worry about my safety here [the UK]I told skyTrevor Phillips.

“I certainly cannot travel to some places,” she added, noting that she would be extradited.

Alexei Navalny's name will become synonymous with courage. Vladimir Putin has become one of the cowards.

Russia has a tradition of admiring strong men. They had one on Navalny. They have just discovered that they have a weak and cowardly person in Putin. Every family and every soldier in Russia knows that tonight.

Putin has already dealt a fatal blow: to himself.

The wife of jailed Russian opposition leader Vladimir Kara-Murza has admitted she believes “many prisoners” are at risk following the death of Alexei Navalny.

Evgenia Kara-Murza appeared BBC News this morning (February 18), as she explained that her suspicions were raised after her seemingly healthy husband collapsed in 2015.

“I was sleeping with my phone since I was afraid of another call like that,” she said. “I believe my husband’s life is in danger, as are the lives of many other political prisoners… These people are held behind bars, often suffering from serious medical conditions, without proper medical treatment.”

Shadow Foreign Secretary David Lammy has called for Russian President Vladimir Putin to be brought before an international tribunal over crimes against humanity following the death of Alexei Navalny.

He told the BBC's Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme: “We have called for the establishment of a special court for crimes of aggression and crimes against humanity.

“I would like to see Putin before that special court, and held accountable for all his crimes, not only in Ukraine, but as we have seen in the last 48 hours in Russia as well.

“And of course, since Russia will hold elections this year, it is important that the international community can verify that they are free and fair.”

Illegal Immigration Minister Michael Tomlinson said the Foreign Secretary was right to “put the blame” for Alexei Navalny’s death “at Putin’s door”.

He told Sky Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips that Lord Cameron had been “very firm and strong in condemning and frankly blaming Putin for what happened”.

He added: “Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, we have imposed sanctions on 1,700 individuals and entities as well, and it is right for the Secretary of State to consider the appropriate next steps.”

He continued: “It is very clear, as the Foreign Minister said, to put the blame at Putin’s door.

He added: “Alexei Navalny was a courageous politician, and all of us who defend politics in the West know how difficult it is and how challenging it is, but imagine how difficult it is to try to stand up to Putin.

He added: “In my view, the Foreign Minister is absolutely right to blame Putin.”

Navalny, 47, who was Vladimir Putin's most prominent critic, died on Friday in the brutal Arctic “Polar Wolf” penal colony at Kharp, about 1,200 miles northeast of Moscow, where he was serving a three-decade prison sentence. The prison authorities, who announced his death, claimed that he lost consciousness after walking.

More than 400 people have been detained at events in 32 Russian cities since the death of Alexei Navalny, President Vladimir Putin's most vocal opponent, according to the rights group OVD-Info, as Russians continued to collect and lay flowers.

This is the largest wave of arrests at political events in Russia since September 2022, when more than 1,300 people were detained in demonstrations against the “partial mobilization” of reservists for Putin's military campaign in Ukraine.

The prison service said Navalny, a 47-year-old former lawyer, lost consciousness and died on Friday after an outing at the Polar Wolf penal colony in the Arctic where he was serving a three-decade prison sentence.

OVD-Info, which reports on freedom of assembly in Russia, said the largest number of arrests occurred in St. Petersburg and Moscow, where support for Navalny has traditionally been strong. As of 2000 GMT on Saturday, more than 200 people had been arrested in St. Petersburg.

But there was no mention of the events in official Russian news agencies, which are under full Kremlin control. Nor were there stories of hundreds of people across Russia who continued to defy authorities to lay flowers at impromptu memorials to Navalny.

For the mother of Alexei Navalny, the Russian opposition leader who died aged 47 in an Arctic penal colony, the journey to recover her son's body on Saturday was an odyssey with no clear destination.

In the end, she didn't get what she came for.

A note delivered to Navalny's mother said he died at 2:17 p.m. on Friday, according to Navalny's spokesman Kira Yarmysh. Prison officials told his mother when she arrived at the penal colony on Saturday that her son died of “sudden death syndrome,” Ivan Zhdanov, director of Navalny’s anti-corruption foundation, wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.

Yarmysh said that a prison colony employee said that the body was transferred to the nearby city of Salekhard as part of a post-mortem investigation. Navalny's team wrote on its Telegram channel that when Navalny's mother and one of the late politician's lawyers visited the morgue in Salekhard, it was closed. But the lawyer called the morgue and informed his team that the body was not there.

Yarmysh said that another lawyer for Navalny went to the Investigative Committee of Salekhard and was told that the cause of Navalny's death had not yet been determined and that new investigations were underway and their results would be released next week. She added that the Russian Investigative Committee informed Navalny's team that the body would not be handed over to his relatives until those investigations were completed.

David Cameron indicated the possibility of new sanctions being imposed on Russian officials, following the death of Alexei Navalny.

The Foreign Secretary joined other G7 ministers at the Munich Security Conference in calling on Russia to “fully explain” how the jailed opposition leader died, amid pressure on Western leaders to respond.

Lord Cameron used the German meeting to reiterate the UK's call for countries to seize Russian central bank assets currently in the West as a means of financing the reconstruction of Ukraine, The Times reported.

This comes as the second anniversary of the Russian invasion approaches, which was marked by the confirmation that Vladimir Putin's forces had taken full control of the city of Avdiivka, located on the front line.