is it game over for the anti—putin movement? leonid volkov, currently in washington, dc, 3 very warm welcome to hardtalk. thanks for the invitation. you've had, what, roughly three weeks to process the death of your political boss, alexei navalny. tell me, what are your overriding feelings right now? well, i still can't believe it, frankly.

there is a deep, bleeding hole in my heart. alexei was not only, like, a political leader, he was also a very close friend. and, you know, in the last years when he was imprisoned, and we were exchanging emails, were often discussing, like, the future and how we will go there and here, and discuss this and that, and do this and that. and it's hard for mejust to get used to this new world where alexei isn't here any more, because he was a great personality who was, like, really able to fill any room where he was in. and he's very much missed. i understand the deep grief. would it also be fair to use the word "despair" about your current feeling? no, that's not correct. alexi was a very inspirational leader, and his main slogan

was, like, "never give up." and if there is one thing that we've learned from him in the many years that we worked together — i worked together with him for 13 years — was this thing, like, never give up. to be in despair would make his sacrifice in vain, would be betrayal of his legacy, of his political legacy. and that's something that we will never do. this is a very personal question, and probably quite a difficult one, but i know that you, alongside his family, led by yulia navalnaya — his now widow — you were all discussing with him the decision he took to go back to russia, after getting to germany to recuperate from that novichok poisoning. you have said that you didn't really try to dissuade him from going back — and given everything that has happened, do you now wish

you had tried harder? as i explained many times in many interviews, we never actually had this discussion. even when alexei was still in coma after the novichok poisoning attempt in august 2020, we all knew — i mean his family and close friends — we all knew that he will go back to russia as soon as possible, as soon as he recovers, because that was his way. he was a russian politician who never did anything wrong, and always wanted the best for his country. he wanted to be with his people. well, now he's buried there in moscow. i'm sure that... ..there was no other option for alexei navalny — otherwise, it wouldn't be alexei navalny. so, once again, we never, ever had a discussion of whether he should go or stay.

i mean, ijust asked you whether you regretted that you didn't have that discussion. you're telling me, well, it would have been pointless, but i mean, you could have tried. we could have tried many things differently. life has a way of making decisions and going through some forks. but i mean... ..regretting the past... ..is not really useful. the decisions that were taken were taken in that context, in that mood, in that historical moment. it was before the war, of course. what we didn't expect was the level of craziness that vladimir putin had. that's true that, when he returned to russia injanuary 202i, no—one expected that putin would just, like, start a full—scale war on the european continentjust

in the year after. and when it happened, we realised how crazy putin actually is, and how we actually underestimated it. and then we started to try our best to get alexei out of there, to get him out of russia. yeah. i have a couple of brief questions about the specific circumstances of alexei navalny�*s death. your colleague, who is currently chair, i believe, of the board of the anti—corruption foundation, maria pevchikh — maria pevchikh has said that, just before navalny died, there was a prisoner—swap deal in the offing, which would have seen navalny released from prison, sent to the west in exchange, she says, for vadim kalashnikov, a russian hit man who was serving a life sentence for murder in germany for killing a chechen rebel commander. is that your information, too? and what proof do you have?

because the germans haven't confirmed this story. i rely entirely on what maria says, and i can only second to her words. she was trying tirelessly, for those two years, to... ..orchestrate, to make such a deal possible. i can say that i always had doubts, if it's actually possible, in the sense that i never thought that there is a solid reason for putin to release navalny. putin had some kind of, you know, religious fear for alexei navalny, as you know, he never called him by name. he always very manually controlled all this torture that happened to alexei navalny during three years of his imprisonment. and my thinking was that, while our colleagues were tirelessly working with foreign governments

to try to make such a prisoner exchange deal possible, putin will not go for it — like, at the very last moment, he will cancel, or he will suggest something else. and indeed... what i did expect... ..you and others, leonid volkov, have quite explicitly blamed putin for navalny�*s death. you say that navalny�*s blood is on putin's hands. but... yes. ..again, the russian investigation is ongoing, as i understand it. no, no, no. hang on, but i've got to say this, because it's important — dmitry peskov, the kremlin spokesman, has made it plain that yulia navalnaya's suggestion that her husband was killed by novichok poisoning inside the prison — peskov has said that's obnoxious, it's absolutely unsubstantiated. so, again, it comes down to credibility of evidence. do you have evidence? let me recall that dmitry peskov is a war criminal,

first of things. in citing dmitry peskov or vladimir putin, you have to remind who they are. these people are lying always, that's theirjob. they lie when they open their mouths. there is no official investigation in russia. the official cause of death, according to russian authorities, is a death of natural reasons — and it isn't. alexei navalny was murdered by vladimir putin. 0ur investigative team is working on this, we will publish all the material we'll have in due time. back to your question of these exchange talks — i never expected that putin would actually release him, but i didn't expect that he would just kill him in order not to continue this discussion of a possible prisoner exchange. and that's what happened. you personally were clearly very moved by the numbers

of russians who defied police tactics and repression, and who came out to express their grief — whether it be at the impromptu memorials in different russian cities, or indeed at the funeral on march 1st. and altogether, if you total up the numbers, there were thousands of russians who took that decision to go public with their grief and their sympathy for mr navalny. ultimately, though, we now know hundreds of those people have been arrested. we believe, according to the 0vd info site, which collects human rights evidence inside russia, that facial—recognition technology is still being used to arrest and detain people who made those public expressions. do you believe that the numbers who are prepared to risk their personal security go beyond these thousands? how far does it go?

according to our estimates, approximately 40,000 russians participated in navalny�*s funeral, and then came to say goodbye to him in the next few days, on saturday and sunday, march 2nd and 3rd. this is also verified by independentjournalistic outlets, such as mediazona, very reputable ones. 40,000 participated, while eight million watched the funeral online. and this ratio, 200 to one, is very characteristic for the level of repression and fear. so, every of these very brave people who participated in the funeral in person is just like a tip of an iceberg, who represented 200 people who were sympathetic, but were unable to take the risks, were unable to come, were unable to, yeah, to be subject for police investigation, camera recognition, potential arrest, harassment by the police, etc. and the fact that, first of all, millions viewed online,

and second, 40,000 still participated despite all the risks, is actually something very encouraging, i would say, because, as someone tweeted. .. 0k, yeah... hang on, hang on, i want to ask you a follow—up question. so, those numbers are very interesting, particularly if you're talking about millions who followed the funeral through your social media broadcasts, which you personally were intimately involved with. the question for many of those people now is, where does the leadership come from, now that navalny, the inspiration, the charismatic leader, is dead? and you're his former chief of staff, you've worked with navalny for much more than a decade. you now have to think of the future. where does the leadership come from now? so, let me finish, because there is a very important thought that i really like. you can't imagine tens of thousands of people chanting

"hitler is a murderer" in berlin in, like, 1944. but that's what happened in moscow last weekend. and it was also inspired by yulia navalnaya's leadership — navalny�*s wife, widow — who publicly announced she would step in in a public role to continue as her late husband's ghost. and we saw also, based on the reaction in russian social media and among our supporters, that this was also an important source of inspiration. so, is that your first answer to me about leadership, leonid volkov, that we should be looking to yulia navalnaya? i noticed that she made a speech before the european parliament. she's just released a rather well—produced video, echoing her late husband's call that russians should express their opposition to putin by gathering at noon on march 17th at polling stations — when, of course, the presidential election is taking place — to embody a resistance and opposition to putin.

i wonder whether you are now pushing yulia forward? you're a very experienced campaign manager, are you working with her? well, i'm working at the anti—corruption foundation, the organisation that alexei has founded. yulia was a chairwoman of advisory board of the organisation. now she announced that she would continue alexei's work, which means that she will do more in a public role. you mentioned the video that she released today about the political campaign against putin on the voting day. you mentioned the speech she did in strasbourg addressing the european parliament. so, she is, in fact, doing what the political leaders should do, given the circumstances... but does she — hang on — does she want this leadership role? because in the past, we've heard her say that she much preferred to be behind the scenes. she would advise her husband on speech—making,

but she didn't want to make the speeches herself. but has that fundamentally changed? and is she now the de facto leader of your anti—corruption movement but the wider opposition movement? well, this has changed, obviously, on february 16th. and it happened that i was in munich at the security conference alongside yulia on february 16th, and, of course, it hasn't been an easy decision for her to take this responsibility and the weight, and the risks of the public leadership of the organisation. but she did it. i mean, that's here. and we, as navalny�*s organisation, are, of course, 100% supportive of this decision. and the whole apparatus of the anti—corruption foundation, russia's leading opposition organisation is, of course, now supporting yulia navalnaya. interesting you put it like that, but if i may, isn't there a fundamental problem here? we started our discussion talking about navalny�*s

motivations — you said you never tried to really raise with him whether it was wise to go back to russia — because navalny�*s conviction was quite clear. to be the leader of a russian opposition to putin, he felt he absolutely had to be inside russia to be credible, to be able to lead the russian people. yulia navalnaya is not in russia. she shows no sign right now of wanting to, or being able to return to russia. and isn't that going to be a fundamental weakness going forward? yulia navalnaya is not a copy or a clone of alexei. she's a different person with different convictions and ideas, and different ways to navigate the political landscape. and the times have, of course, very much changed. i already mentioned that alexei's decision to go back to russia was taken in the pre—war era, which was very different from where we are in 2024. do you fear — just one

more thought on that — do you fear there could be a parallel with neighbouring belarus, where we saw svetla na tikhanovskaya, you know, she says "win an election" — but of course, president lukashenko then engineered his own victory. tikhanovskaya was forced to leave the country, and i think it's fair to say that her leverage inside belarus is not the same outside the country. is it possible for your movement to gain the traction it needs inside russia when you no longer have an inspirational, charismatic figure who is inside the country? the challenges are very clear, and it's very complicated to stay up to date with the political agenda, with the domestic policies working from abroad. we did it for three years with alexei imprisoned, and the organisation operating from abroad. the challenges are very clear for us. i don't like the comparison to svetla na tikhanovskaya.

for instance, svetlana won the election, and navalny, or yulia navalnaya never had the chance to participate in the presidential election in russia. tikhanovskaya's credibility comes from this election that she won in 2020. yulia's credibility is not granted. it will depend on her next steps and her next political actions. but now it's derived from the movement of navalny�*s supporters inside russia. even now, three years after navalny was imprisoned and we started to operate from abroad, 85% of the subscribers and followers on our social media are inside the country. and we actually were working hard not to become an emigre or, like, a diaspora organisation. it's always very important for us to stay in touch with our supporters inside the country, and we developed, like, technical tools to do it, and, like, political tools.

we endorse candidates in local elections, we organise protests... but, yeah, ok, i know... but if you don't want to be an emigre organisation, it's a simple yes/no question — will yulia navalnaya return to russia? when putin will be defeated, of course she will. let's just talk about strategy. that's clear on that front, but let's talk about forward—looking strategy for your organisation. here are the words of kira yarmysh, who you work with, a long—time navalny activist. she said after february 16th, after the death of navalny, she said, "we are going to need to undergo changes. "we are all perfectly aware of this." now, one change that some are discussing in the anti—putin opposition outside of russia is a need for much more joint enterprise, for a coalition of forces, perhaps including, for example, mikhail khodorkovsky�*s 0pen russia movement. there's maxim katz,

who has a vast anti—putin following on social media. he's based in israel. are you now looking to act jointly with these other anti—putin forces? we are acting jointly, like every single political force in the russian opposition... well, with the greatest of respect, you're not. here's a direct quote from mr navalny not so long ago when asked about coalitions, he said, "i'm going to be direct — to hell with your coalition." exactly! exactly. we are strictly opposed to any, like, formal coalition to a round table debate itself. and we always were very strong proponents of the idea of ad hoc coalition. we don't need to have a lengthy discussion with a politburo to decide that these political actions that we are doing now — this noon against putin campaign — is a good idea. and every single political force in the russian opposition — not only the liberals, also the left and so on —

are supportive of it. we didn't need to build, like, a formal organisation. no, there are very different political organisations, each talking to their audiences through their media channels, and then making the message of the opposition forces much stronger. while this hypothetic coalition, which would require a lot of resources, would actually be very limited in its abilities to reach out, we don't need an opposition politburo, an opposition united russia. we already have putin's united russia. all right, let's just end with a thought about where you are right now, which is washington, dc. how disappointed are you with what is happening in washington, in terms of blocked new military and financial assistance for ukraine — ukraine, of course, at war with putin's russia — and also, joe biden who, in 2021, promised, quote, "devastating consequences for russia if navalny "were to die in prison"? frankly, in the last three weeks, we haven't seen those devastating consequences.

do you feel, in washington, dc, that there is a failure? a failure really to address vladimir putin and the threat he represents? i'm not an american voter. i'm a russian voter. and i don't think i'm really in a position to tell them what to do. but what i am doing here during this week in washington, dc, we are trying to devise, to find ways to do some practical steps. we offer our experience, for instance, in tracking putin's money to americans or to europeans, also into the uk, so that this experience could be applied to make putin suffer, and to make him pay the price. 0urjob is to... but there's been two years

of talk about crippling sanctions on russia, and we see that those sanctions are very far from crippling, and the russian economy is growing. that's true... well, russian economy's not growing. only the military is growing, while all the other sectors are doing very bad. but, of course, sanctions are not efficient. and, once again, we were around for the last two years explaining, like, what to do with the sanctions, how to address...how to fight against putin's regime more efficiently. and, yes, regretfully, there was not enough attention to what we've suggested. hopefully, these terrible and devastating events of navalny�*s murder will help at least someone to listen more to my message and to yulia's message. we're almost out of time, but the fact is, navalny�*s dead, putin is going to be re—elected with a thumping majority, barring a miracle, in the next few days. and many would listen to you and think you have

absolutely no cause any more to hope for russia's future. what would you say to that? we have a hope for russian future. putin is not for eternity there. 0urjob is to make alexei's sacrifice not to be in vain, which is to build the beautiful russia of the future he dreamt of — a normal, decent european country, which russia can become. and we are, navalny�*s team, we are absolutely sure this is possible. and last thing — putin will not be re—elected. there is no such thing as an election in russia. there is a mock circus event which we try to use to organise people against him. leonid volkov, we are now out of time. thank you very much forjoining me on hardtalk.

hello there. over the next few days, the winds going to be picking up from the east or southeast. it's going to be particularly windy on friday. we'll have more of the cloud affecting eastern parts of the country. i think western areas will see most of the sunshine. that's because high pressure over scandinavia will be pushing westwards against this low pressure system, so we'll start to see the isobars squeezing together. so for thursday, it's a bright start across northern and western areas. quite a chilly start, mind you — early mist and fog will clear as the wind begins to pick up. eastern areas seeing thicker cloud at times. it will stay rather grey here, maybe some spots of drizzle. a few showers into the afternoon across the midlands, into east wales. 0therwise, many places should stay dry and we should see sunny spells. top temperatures 11 degrees but cooler along north sea coasts with that increasing onshore breeze. the winds continue to pick up through thursday night, pushing more cloud into the midlands, northern england, large parts of scotland. but there will still be some clearer skies, particularly through southern and central areas. so where the skies are clear, it's going to be cold. where we have the cloud, the breeze, then less cold — generally, i think two to five degrees.

now, more isobars on the charts for friday. a strong east, south—easterly wind picking up as this low pressure system starts to push back against the area of high pressure, so a blustery day for all. there will be quite a bit of sunshine around, we think for, england and wales. more clouds for northern england, certainly central and eastern scotland, and some good spells of sunshine for western scotland, northern ireland. but the winds a feature for all areas, particularly so along north sea coast. so that will peg the temperatures back. although we're looking at single digits on the north sea, it could feel even colder than that. further west in the sunshine, ten or ii celsius. into saturday, this area of low pressure sideswipes the south and southwest of the country. again, it stays quite blustery, quite a few isobars on the charts for saturday. and we'll see showers or longer spells of rain affecting parts of the west and the southwest. some sunshine around too. it's not going to be a wash—out. a lot of cloud, though, for northern england and large parts of central and eastern scotland.

a bit of drizzle on the hills there. feeling quite chilly in the north, but 11 to 13 in the south, some milder air being pulled into this area of low pressure which will — by sunday into monday — pull out into the near continent. you'll see the isobars opening out. so we should start to see some drier weather, lighter winds as we head through sunday, certainly into monday and tuesday. but east—facing coasts will always see more in the way of cloud, perhaps still with a little bit of drizzle over the higher ground.

live from london, this is bbc news. three crew members killed in a houthi missile strike on a cargo ship off yemen. will have the latest. the armourer of rust, where the cinematographer was shot dead, is convicted of involuntary manslaughter. are we better or worse off? uk households and businesses are crunching the numbers following jeremy hunt's budget — probably his last before a general election. and feeling hot? that's because global data shows — february — was the warmest on record. hello.

a very warm welcome to you. we have a packed programme. the united states vowed to hold the houthi militia group accountable for the deaths of three civilians after a missile strike hit a commercial ship in the gulf of aden on wednesday. at least four people have also been injured. this is the first time such an attack has resulted in fatalities. the greek—owned — but barbados flagged — ship was hit off the southern coast of yemen. the us central command, which oversees operations in the middle east, released this image of the vessel. aru na iyengar reports. houthi attacks in the red sea have now thrown deadly, yesterday, a missile strike by the group on a librarian or an cargo ship resulted in three crew members being killed. there are courses of action like this, join us and uk airstrikes on targets in yemen

last month.