Macron hails 'courage' of Russians risking arrest to honour Navalny

French President Emmanuel Macron has praised the “courage” of thousands of Russians who risked arrest to mourn opposition leader Alexei Navalny as he was buried in Moscow on Friday. A Russia specialist in France sees signs the Kremlin is nervous.

Large crowds of Navalny supporters queued for hours on Frriday to pay their respects to the 47-year-old – President Vladimir Putin's fiercest critic for more than a decade.

Surrounded by a heavy police presence, they risked arrest chanting "No to war!", “Russia will be free and “Russia without Putin” as they streamed from a nearby church to the cemetery .

Some branded Putin a "murderer" and called for the release of political prisoners.

"Courage was needed to go and pay tribute to Alexei Navalny. Thousands of Russians did not fail to do so. That is his heritage," President Macron said in a post on X.

Rights monitoring group OVD-Info said Russian police had arrested at least 128 people attending tributes in 19 cities on Friday.

Navalny died in an Arctic prison colony last month, where he was serving a 19-year sentence on "extremism" charges largely seen as politically motivated.

Few details are known on the cause of his death. Officials say he collapsed after going for a walk but his wife alleges he was killed on the orders of President Putin.

'Striking' turnout

Russia has cracked down hard on all dissent since it invaded Ukraine in February 2022. Strict military censorship laws have been used to prosecute hundreds that have spoken out publicly against the campaign.

Given the clampdown on all forms of political opposition "the strong presence of Russian citizens paying tribute to Navalny is very striking" says Russia expert Françoise Daucé.

"They braved danger to pay him a final tribute, it's almost a surprise," she told RFI, underlining that there was also an "impressive" four million people who followed the ceremony on the Navalny Team YouTube channel.

With the majority of opposition activists either in prison or living in exile, including Navalny's widow and brother, there are fears that the opposition leader's death has put paid once and for all to any hope of a challenge to Vladimir Putin.

But Daucé believes there are encouraging signs. That thousands of ordinary people are prepared to turn out and show support for Navalny  suggests that "in the long run ... political protest could resurface".

Despite the total lack of insitutional opposition, she points to a disparity between this absence of threat and yet the energy the regime deploys to control any criticism, repressing even the most symbolic forms of protest.

"It reflects a kind of nervousness... [the Kremlin] senses there are contrary opinions, perhaps even headwinds blowing within Russian society."