Opposition leader says border guards prevented him from flying out of a Moscow airport

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

The Russian opposition leader, Alexei Navalny, has been prevented from flying out of a Moscow airport to travel to France for a hearing at the European court of human rights in Strasbourg.

“Border guards are saying that leaving is forbidden for me. There is some kind of letter that says I am prohibited from leaving, but there is no explanation why,” Navalny tweeted.

He said he had planned to board a flight to Frankfurt and on to Strasbourg, where the court is expected to rule on Thursday on whether his detentions in Russia this year were politically motivated.

The hearing could prove a major embarrassment for the Kremlin, which routinely dismisses Navalny, arguably Russia’s most popular opposition figure, as a troublemaker with no political backing.

Navalny’s lawyer, Ivan Zhdanov, tweeted a photo of the document barring him from leaving Russia.

The anti-corruption campaigner was released last month after being sentenced to 20 days in a Moscow detention centre for organising anti-Kremlin protests.

He also served a 30-day sentence in September for organising a rally at the start of the year. At the time, Amnesty International described him as a prisoner of conscience and said he had committed no crime.

Navalny came to prominence as an organiser of rallies against the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, that shook Russia in 2011 and 2012 after accusations of vote-rigging in parliamentary elections.

His anti-corruption rhetoric is especially popular with younger people who follow him online.