Putin ordered secret service to stop Navalny’s funeral turning into insurrection

Police observe as mourners walk towards the Borisovskoye Cemetery for the funeral of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny (Picture: AP)

Russia’s secret services has been ordered to prevent Alexei Navalny’s funeral from turning into a revolt – as the weight of the Kremlin’s regime is hanging in the balance.

Vladimir Putin has a right to be paranoid. After a protest outside a courtroom in the Republic of Bashkortostan resulted in riot police being pelted with snowballs, authorities are out to quash any sign of rebellion.

The leader is also haunted by history -after all, it was the farewell of Nobel-prize-winning physicist Andrei Sakharov in 1989, which helped bring down the Soviet Union.

It is understood both state and loyalist media were ordered not to cover Navalny’s funeral.

‌So most Russians have not heard the accusations by the oppositionist’s family and Western leaders that Putin ordered his death.

The secret services were ordered to ‘protect the constitutional order from threats’, reported the independent Moscow Times.

Floral tributes, portraits of late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny and messages are left outside the former Russian Embassy in Tbilisi on March 1, 2024 (Picture: AFP)

An official told the media outlet: ‘The task was set to prevent a picture similar to the farewell to Sakharov.’

Hundreds of thousands had attended the funeral of Sakharov, winner of the 1975 Nobel Prize, in Moscow.

‌’Putin demanded that the FSB prevent a rebellion over Navalny’s death,’ said the outlet, citing insider sources.

The Kremlin ‘held a series of meetings with senior generals of the Federal Security Service and the Ministry of Internal Affairs following the death of the opposition leader Alexei Navalny in a colony above the Arctic Circle’.‌

Thousands of mourners queued in Moscow to pay their respects (Picture: Reuters)

Heavy police presence was observed at the scene (Picture: EPA)

Two senior sources said Navalny’s send-off ’caused unrest among top leadership, despite the ostentatious self-confidence demonstrated by Putin’.

‌An official said: ‘Navalny’s funeral is a stress test for the Russian authorities. This topic was one of the most important at meetings involving Kremlin officials, FSB generals and the Ministry of Internal Affairs.’

Thousands of people arrived for the service outside Moscow’s Church of the Icon of the Mother of God Soothes My Sorrows.

The atmosphere was tense, with authorities blocking mobile phone signals.

Inside, a casket with Navalny’s body was covered with flowers. A video showed his mother Lyudmila paying a final goodbye to her son.

She remained at the grave for three hours after he was lowered into the ground.

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