Navalny's health under the harsh prison system was a major concern before his death

The Russian prison service said that Navalny (47 years old) collapsed in the Kharp penal colony in northwestern Siberia, adding that he began to feel “unwell” after walking.

Over the years, Navalny's health has deteriorated as his role as Putin's main rival has grown. He has been physically attacked, arrested, harassed, and, in 2020, poisoned with a Soviet-era nerve agent in a suspected assassination attempt.

The attack nearly killed him, and he fell ill several times while in prison over the past three years.

Standing more than 6 feet tall, Navalny was once a towering presence. But while campaigning against corruption, violent attacks left him with lasting health problems.

In 2017, shortly after his team released a video accusing then-Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev of corruption, unidentified assailants threw green disinfectant in his face during a public appearance. The attack damaged his right eye, requiring surgery.

The most significant attack was nerve agent poisoning. He was on a flight out of Tomsk, where he met local activists, when he became seriously ill on the plane. In a video taken by another passenger and posted online, Navalny can be heard crying in pain.

The plane made an emergency landing in the Siberian city of Omsk, where Navalny fell into a coma. He was eventually transferred for treatment to Berlin, where German authorities announced that he had been poisoned with the chemical nerve agent Novichok.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who rejected Russian claims that poison could be ruled out, said a military hospital had found “conclusive” evidence of the agent’s presence and declared Navalny a “victim of a crime.”

Novichok is a class of chemical weapons developed by the Soviet Union. It disrupts the connection between muscles and nerves, preventing an enzyme that the nervous system needs to function. This type of venom can be fatal, usually causing respiratory failure.

Navalny spent five months recovering in Germany, where he relearned how to walk, talk and eat.

According to Robert Chilcot, a toxicology expert at the University of Hertfordshire in Britain, there are not enough known cases of Novichok poisoning to determine the long-term health impact.

But there may be similarities with “classical” nerve agents. Sarin gas, like sarin, can cause cognitive impairment, nerve damage outside the brain and spinal cord, and changes in the immune system, Chilcot said.

“There is certainly a possibility that prior exposure to Novichok may have contributed to this [Navalny’s] “Early death,” Chilcot wrote in an email. “Certainly the potential circumstances of his imprisonment were an aggravating factor.”

In 2021, Navalny returned to Russia, where he was arrested shortly after landing at Moscow's Sheremetyevo International Airport for violating parole in a previous case.

Navalny remained imprisoned until his death, first in detention centers and then in Penal Colony No. 2, about 110 miles east of Moscow. There, guards deliberately kept Navalny and other prisoners awake in what amounted to torture, his lawyer Vadim Kobzev said. He said at the time.

In social media posts from that period, Navalny said he was experiencing numbness in his right leg and that the prison doctor had given him ibuprofen but it was not diagnosed. He then went on a three-week hunger strike to protest the medical treatment he received at that facility, ending only after civilian doctors advised him that he might die.

His lawyers and partners said last year that Navalny continued to suffer severe, severe stomach pain and began having seizures.

Early last year, he developed a cough and fever, prompting his wife, Yulia Navalnaya, to publicly urge prison authorities to provide him with medication. Meanwhile, more than 200 Russian doctors signed a letter calling on Putin to “stop abusing” Navalny, whose health they said has been “deliberately damaged.”

By the time of his death, he had been held for 300 days in solitary confinement cells for alleged wrongdoing, adding further pressure on his regime, his colleagues said. In April, he lost 17 pounds after serving one stint in a cramped cell where he was allowed only a book and a cup.

“Regarding the very glaring and strange situation around Navalny’s health, with seizures that showed no signs at all, we cannot rule out the possibility that he is simply being ‘slowly poisoned’ so that his health does not deteriorate significantly, but gradually and steadily,” Kobzev posted on social media. Social in April.

“This may seem delusional and paranoid to someone else, but not to Navalny after Novichok,” he said.

In August, a closed court convicted Navalny of several charges related to financing and inciting “extremist” activity, and sentenced him to 19 years in prison in a “special regime” penal colony., The highest security prison in the Russian system.

“Special regime” colonies, reserved for the most dangerous criminals, prohibit family visits and keep the lights in prison cells constantly on.

In a post on social media after the ruling, Navalny said he understood it was a life sentence. “I fully understand that, like many political prisoners, I am sentencing him to life imprisonment. He wrote: “Where life is measured by the duration of my life or the duration of the life of this regime.”

In December, Navalny's team lost contact with him for several weeks while transferring him to the new system, before finally finding him at Kharp, also known as IK-3.

Kharp prison, which dates back to the Soviet-era Gulag system, is geographically isolated and located in an area known for its harsh weather.

Russian prisons have long been criticized by human rights groups for widespread abuse, poor conditions and lack of medical support. In its 2022 report on human rights in Russia, the State Department noted reports that prison authorities systematically tortured inmates, “leading in some cases to death or suicide.”