Thousands defied President Vladimir Putin to pay their final respects to Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny on Friday, March 1.

A photo taken inside the Church of the Icon of the Mother of God Soothe My Sorrows showed the 47-year-old politician’s body resting in a coffin covered in red and white roses, with candles burning around him.

His parents, Lyudmila Navalnya and Anatoly Navalny, with their faces buried in grief, could be seen seated next to their dead son, surrounded by other relatives.

A hearse carrying his body then arrived at a Moscow cemetery following a brief funeral service with Navalny’s allies claiming the presiding Russian Orthodox priest had been pressured to wrap the event as quickly as possible.

Navalny died in an arctic penal colony this month..  He had been imprisoned since returning from his homeland following a poisoning by a nerve gas. His family still maintains that he was killed by Putin.

Russian authorities still haven’t announced the cause of death for Navalny, 47, who crusaded against official corruption and organized big protests as Putin’s fiercest political foe.

As Navalny set out on his final journey to the Borisovskoye cemetery, thousands of people lined the streets along the route chanting, “We will not forget” and “Russia will be free.”

Hundreds of thousands more watched the proceedings as they were streamed live on YouTube.

Police in riot gear have been sent to the area around the service and snipers have been positioned on the Russian capital’s rooftops as a precaution.

His supporters said several churches in Moscow refused to hold the service before Navalny’s team got permission from one in the capital’s Maryino district, where he once lived before his 2020 poisoning, treatment in Germany and subsequent arrest on his return to Russia.

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