A. Vershinina ― Alexei, good afternoon. We’re very glad to hear from you after nearly a month of your absence. Congratulations! A. Navalny ― Thank you! A. Vershinina ― Alexei, tell us how those 25 days in the special detention center went, what you did there, and how you’re feeling after this administrative arrest? A. Navalny ― Unfortunately, I can’t offer radio listeners any especially interesting stories from life in the special detention center. Life there is fairly routine. You do nothing, just sit in your cell. Mostly you read or listen to the radio. This was my seventh administrative arrest, though admittedly the longest one so far. Unfortunately, Russian politics is structured in such a way that if you’re an opposition politician, you have to get used to the special detention center. And in a sense, I have gotten used to it. Nothing new happened to me there. A. Vershinina ― Your lawyers were concerned that you might have problems with your eye, which still required medical attention. Were there any problems? How are you feeling? A. Navalny ― There were no problems. I was allowed to bring some necessary medications. Yes, the doctor did tell me that it was highly undesirable for me to be in a cell where everyone smokes. There were 12 people in there, and everyone smoked except me. But still, I used the medication. On Monday I’ll go to the doctor and find out what’s going on and whether there have been any changes. A. Vershinina ― And what happened when an ambulance was called to the detention facility for you? A. Navalny ― I simply caught a cold. Since the vents were open all the time, I got quite sick. For three days I had a fairly high fever, and I even asked for an ambulance to be called so they could give me an injection to bring the temperature down. They gave me the necessary medication, and I recovered fairly quickly. A. Vershinina ― And who were you sharing a cell with this time? A. Navalny ― The usual crowd: drivers, drug users, hooligans. In fact, they’re quite normal, ordinary people who, for one reason or another, committed offenses. In short, the traditional contingent for places like that. Everyone was interested in talking about politics. A. Vershinina ― Did you learn anything new about yourself? A. Navalny ― No, I didn’t learn anything new about myself. Naturally, we discussed politics all day long, as usually happens. A. Vershinina ― While you were under administrative arrest, politics here didn’t forget about you either. In recent days, attacks on your campaign offices across the country have intensified. How unexpected was that for you and your supporters? Especially since what happened in Moscow with Alexander Turovsky probably goes beyond what anyone might have expected. A. Navalny ― Unfortunately, this mass assault on our offices did not come as a surprise to us. We knew our offices were highly effective structures, ready to run an election campaign. For the past several weeks, the Kremlin had been pretending to treat our organization with irony. Then they saw that, first, it was working effectively. Second, this myth of Putin’s 86% support instantly collapses and disappears in the places and cities where our offices are operating. And what we’ve been seeing in recent days, and especially today, when one report after another comes in about activists being detained, volunteers being detained, searches at offices, actual raids on offices—this is yet another collapse of the myth that Putin supposedly enjoys high support. That support exists only in a situation where no one is engaged in political activity. But we started doing it: we opened offices, we have huge numbers—tens of thousands—of volunteers ready to work, and the authorities immediately show that they are incapable of opposing us with anything except outright police lawlessness. And the word “lawlessness” here is no longer just emotional language—it is a direct description of what is happening. A. Vershinina ― Alexei, aren’t you afraid that these repressive measures we’re seeing from the authorities will scare off your potential supporters? Because not everyone, even if they agree with your politics and your course, is prepared to end up in a hospital or detention center. A. Navalny ― Fortunately, it has to be said that when people end up in the hospital or are subjected to any kind of detention at all, that is more the exception than the rule, although of course these things are extremely unpleasant for us, and we will defend every single person. Most of the time these are just detentions where they stop you, confiscate your leaflets, and let you go. Fortunately, we can see that the authorities are doing this precisely in order to scare off volunteers. But over the past few days, in response to these unprecedented attacks on us, we have seen only an increase in the number of volunteers. People are coming to us because they do not want to see this in the country; they do not want to see any opposition politics subjected to pressure. And we can see the reaction to this—they are only coming to us in greater numbers. We’ve seen an influx of people in recent days. A. Vershinina ― So even this case with Alexander Trovsky in Moscow, when a man was beaten, ended up at Sklif (the Sklifosovsky Emergency Medicine Institute in Moscow), and then was also fined by the court afterward—this won’t affect your supporters’ mood at all? A. Navalny ― At the very least, what we’ve seen is that people got angry—they want to work even harder. We’ve seen a surge in donations to us, and of course it is directly connected to the situation with this volunteer, who was beaten and then fined after being beaten. And we’re seeing huge numbers of people. They simply come in and say: “We read the news about Turovsky, and we’re so outraged and furious that give us leaflets—we want to hand them out.” This outrageous situation is pushing many people who, until yesterday, did not want to engage actively in volunteer political work to start doing exactly that. A. Vershinina ― Alexei, given today’s problems at your offices across the country, with law enforcement officers coming in, searching offices, and detaining volunteers, will there be any changes to the “Big Cleanup Saturday” campaign that began today? A. Navalny ― We’re holding a big “Campaigning Saturday.” It’s taking place today and tomorrow. It’s happening in all major Russian cities. More than 60 cities are involved. We’ve already opened 60 offices. We do not intend to change the format of this campaign. We have enough volunteers, and we have enough materials to carry it out. Of course, the authorities will resist using the methods available to them—namely, they will confiscate volunteers’ leaflets and detain volunteers for a couple of hours. But I’m confident that this weekend, nevertheless, we will not change the format and will carry it through to the end. A. Vershinina ― So tomorrow, basically, the same thing will continue as today: people will go out into the streets and hand out leaflets? A. Navalny ― Yes, we are not canceling anything either today or tomorrow. And while I have the chance, I urge everyone to take part in our big campaigning Saturday. A. Vershinina ― Alexei, it wasn’t only the Russian authorities and Russian law enforcement who didn’t forget about you. While you were under administrative arrest, you were also criticized by people from the so-called liberal camp. Criticism appeared in the press from Kashin, Inozemtsev, and Illarionov. How unexpected was it to hear criticism from them, and will you respond? A. Navalny ― To be honest, I don’t even really know what criticism you’re referring to. Any criticism is useful. You say criticism from the liberal public—well, the liberal public exists precisely in order to criticize. It’s just that, frankly, on the radio playing in the cell, they didn’t report anything about criticism from the liberal public, so I don’t fully understand what this is about. But once I deal with the main matters at hand, I’ll try to read up on it and find out. A. Vershinina ― Well, for example, Illarionov called you a provocateur. He says that “Navalny acts like a provocateur and delivers people up by bringing them out to protest rallies.” A. Navalny ― Well, I’ll read everything he said, in what context, and analyze it. I don’t know—maybe I’ll laugh at some of it, and maybe I’ll respond to some of it. A. Vershinina ― And one last question. Are you currently preparing any new major action? A. Navalny ― Of course we are preparing another major action. We are always preparing another major action. Russian politics needs major anti-corruption actions and major political actions in general. Right now we don’t have any specific plans, because any plans of that kind involve a great deal of work. But of course, as I said yesterday, as soon as I got out of the special detention center, we will use every method of struggle—campaigning and holding rallies, among others, of course. It is very effective, and over the past four months we have become convinced of that. A. Vershinina ― Could it take place, for example, on August 22—Russian National Flag Day? A. Navalny ― That’s the first I’ve heard of it. Who told you that? This is the first time I’m hearing about such a date. A. Vershinina ― So there’s no date yet? A. Navalny ― No date has been set yet.
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