Russian presidential candidate Boris Nadezhdin said that he will not call on his supporters to rally against authorities' decisions to bar him from the election next month, claiming that he learned from the "mistakes" made by now-deceased opposition leader Alexei Navalny.
Speaking to independent Russian newspaper The Moscow Times, Nadezhdin said that calling for protests "would mean exposing my supporters to the police and Rosgvardia's batons."
"That's not right and doesn't lead anywhere," he added.
Hundreds of arrests were made over the weekend after supporters of Navalny, a prominent Kremlin critic who died in a Russian prison last Friday, gathered at vigils to honor his death. Nadezhdin, a former State Duma member, has campaigned for the March 17 presidential election as a "pro-peace" candidate, a direct challenge to Russian President Vladimir Putin's war in Ukraine.
In order to appear on the ballot, Nadezhdin was required to collect at least 100,000 voter signatures, and supporters showed up in droves in January to secure his ticket to the election. But Russia's Central Election Commission claimed to find irregularities in over 15 percent of the signatures included in his application, including the names of dead citizens.
Nadezhdin was adamant that there were no issues with his application and filed an appeal of election officials' decision to the Russian Supreme Court, which upheld the commission's ruling on Wednesday, removing the only remaining candidate challenging Putin's bid for a fifth term in office.
"We'll keep trying to get back to the ballots by using the judiciary system," Nadezhdin told Moscow Times.
"I don't want any revolution or coup d'etat happening in Russia," he added. "I want the government to change as a result of elections."
Newsweek reached out to the Kremlin's press email for comment on Friday night.
Russia prison officials said that Navalny died after he "felt unwell after a walk" and lost consciousness. The activists' family members, however, have blamed Putin's administration for Navalny's death.
President Joe Biden has also said that there is "no doubt" Navalny died at the hands of Putin, and announced 500 new sanctions against Russia on Friday in response—one day before the war in Ukraine would reach its two-year anniversary.
"The American people and people around the world understand that the stakes of this fight extend far beyond Ukraine," Biden said in a statement alongside announcing sanctions. "If Putin does not pay the price for his death and destruction, he will keep going. And the costs to the United States—along with our NATO allies and partners in Europe and around the world—will rise."
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
About the writer
Kaitlin Lewis is a Newsweek reporter on the Night Team based in Boston, Massachusetts. Her focus is reporting on national ... Read more
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