“Let’s make no mistake: Putin is responsible for Navalny’s death. “What has happened to Navalny is further proof of Putin’s brutality,” President Joe Biden said shortly after the news broke. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, whose country has been fighting the Russian invasion for two years, said “it is obvious” that Putin killed him.
Russian authorities handed Navalny’s body over to his mother and wife on Saturday, according to a Navalny spokesman.
“Alexei’s body was
given to his mother”said Kira Yarmysh, a spokesperson for Navalny, on X. “Thank you very much to everyone who demanded this from us.”
“The funeral is still pending,” Yarmysh said. “We don’t know if the authorities will interfere to carry it out as the family wants and as Alexei deserves,” he added.
Navalny’s mother, Lyudmila Navalnaya, previously said authorities tried to force her to agree to a private funeral, or risk having her son buried in the penal colony where he was imprisoned.
Asked whether Russia should allow a public funeral for the opposition leader, Sullivan said the decision should be up to Navalny’s mother.
“I think the president believes that any mother deserves the funeral she would like for her child. That should be a basic human thing, not a matter of politics,” Sullivan said.