endure. ♪ the headlines on al jazeera. the u.s. has become the latest country to impose restrictions on most travelers from india due to the spiraling number of cases there. starting on tuesday, only u.s. citizens and permanent residents will be allowed in. india is battling a second wave and continues to register the world's highest single day infections. gabriel elizondo has more on the u.s. restrictions on travel from india. >> the white house says they gave very close consideration to this very important decision. they say they consulted with

cdc, other health officials, and national security officials as well, but ultimately made the decision to ban all indian citizens from entering the united states. we do not know how long this ban will be in place, but it does go into effect next tuesday on may 4. white house officials were quick to point out that this does not affect any u.s. citizens at all. anchor: in just a few hours, all adults in india will be eligible to get a covid-19 vaccine, but there is concern over shortages with some states saying they have run out of doses. and a fire has swept through a covid-19 ward in an indian city. at least 12 people are dead. that figure is expected to rise. emergency services are battling the fire, which is already damaged large parts of the hospital. patients are being moved to another hospital. at least 21 people have been killed in a truck bomb attack in afghanistan. it happened in the capital of lobar province where a crowd had

gathered to break the ramadan fast. the government has blamed the taliban for the explosion, one of the deadliest in recent months. funerals have been held for some of the 45 people killed in a stampede at an ultra-orthodox jewish festival on thursday. calls are growing for the public inquiry into the disaster, which happened at the largest gathering since the start of the coronavirus pandemic. we will have more news at the top of the hour for you right here on al jazeera. coming up next is "inside story ." ♪ mohammed: alexei navalny faces court in moscow again. the kremlin critic loses his

latest appeal. in his organizations could be declared extremist. what is next for russia's opposition movement and those who had pinned their hopes on navalny? this is "inside story." ♪ hello, and welcome to the program. i am mohammed jamjoom. russian opposition leader and dissident alexei navalny is known by many titles in the west. some see him as one of the few people who can unite opponents against vladimir putin. but now he is limited to speaking his mind in court or jail. russia's financial watchdog has added his campaign offices to a list of so-called extremist organizations ahead of a court decision to outlaw them. his allies are disbanding, but say they are determined to fight

on. bernard smith reports for moscow. bernard: on a poor quality video alexei navalny looked thinner. he has lost 20 kilos since his return from germany in january, telling his wife and the rest of the court he is eating a few spoonfuls of porridge after ending a three week hunger strike. the hearing was an appeal against his conviction for defamation, but putin's most prominent critic had other things to talk about, too. >> 20 years of incompetent government have led to the following result. there is a ground slipping. we have spent millions of dollars an hour and the country continues to slide into poverty. bernard: his ability to have his voice heard is rapidly shrinking. in another moscow courts, prosecutors opened a court to declare navalny's anticorruption group and his regional offices as extremist, making them equivalent to al qaeda. >> navalny's regional campaign

offices do not exist anymore, but there are dozens of mighty regional politicians, thousands of allies. there are powerful organizations that will be doing investigations. bernard: the case was adjourned, but the court has already imposed an interim order stopping navalny's group from operating. >> a rather powerful opponent is standing against us. it is the whole state machine of a nuclear superpower state. it can behave brutally as we see ourselves during the events, which are also related to the current case. we are defending the truth. we believe our client's fbk does not violate any law. bernard: you rarely hear navalny 's name mentioned on russian television. any attempt to remind people who he is is quickly erased. this mural was painted over hours after appearing overnight. supporters say they will carry

on with their anti-kremlin activities. but without navalny's charismatic personality, they might find it much harder to have an impact. bernard smith, al jazeera, moscow. mohammed: let's bring in our guests. in moscow, alexander soloviev, board member of open pressure, and opposition group. in vancouver island, michael bociurkiw, global affairs analyst and former spokesperson for the organization for security and cooperation in europe, or osce. and in moscow, maria lipman, senior associate at the institute for european, russian, and eurasian studies. this move to ban all navalny's political organizations, to declare them extremist, navalny supporters see this as an inevitability at this point, right? that is why offices are in the process of being disbanded, correct? maria: yes, this is correct. i think the government is out to

destroy navalny's organizations, formal and informal, and it is a broad campaign to destroy anything and anyone who dares express open and vocal disloyalty to the regime. it is not limited to navalny himself and his organizations. it goes much broader, to some media outlets, to lawyers, to nongovernment organitions. and it seems the campaign will continue, and the government is very serious about it. it is determined to put an end to open disloyalty. mohammed: alexander, picking up on the point maria was making, how dangerous will this extremist able make things for navalny supporters, staff members at his organization, and does this extremist as a nation mean staff and supporters are going to be potentially facing prison time? alexander: despite the fact that we have already had clearly

political articles on this organization for more than six years, this is a totally new level of pressure because if you are an organization or you personally, or just a number of people which is also allowed to call a number of people and extremist organization without even having a legal entity, if you are being called this extremist label or if you have been given this label, that means that anything that concerns you, even in the past -- yes, that is still possible in russia. even in the past when it was legal, it may be used as the tool to say that you are also extremist, even if you have been given legally -- you have been donating money to them, even if you shared their post, even if you liked their post. this is an unprecedented level of pressure.

but i think that still does not mean that their net will be destroyed 100%. i think even if they continued to make the videos on anticorruption, which sometimes get something like more than 100 million views, it is already going to be great. mohammed: there are a lot of analysts in the past who had suggested that president putin would not publicly go after alexei navalny in too harsh away, suggesting perhaps that putin was worried of how much of a threat navalny could be. but it seems now that president putin is really no longer tolerating navalny, right? michael: absolutely. he is now through these actions with our fellow guests as they have described, he has expressed what a big threat navalny is. i should say, one thing we have looked at and have seen from

covid-19 is a lot of strongmen in authoritarian regimes have used the pandemic to level the playing field in their favor. that is exactly what is happening right now. i would describe the actions as chilling, as scary, as there is no limit to it. they have gone after political opponents, but they have not finished. they are also going after media. you will see liberal media outlets closed down. you will see artists already under scrutiny and will be intimidated. the thing that worries me too is the list of countries, including canada where i am right now, will be labeled as unfriendly countries, and what that means on a practical ground is that russian staff of various western embassies will be not allowed to be working there. one more quick thing if i can is another big difference between now and the cold war, which was another chilling atmosphere, is the putin administration has technology on their side. so it is much easier for them

and essence to go after their critics, looking at their digital footprints to persecute them. it is a very scary atmosphere right now. mohammed: maria, if i could zoom back for a minute and talk about tactics in the past versus tactics now. in the past, what we would typically see in russia, prosecutors going after opposition figures like alexei navalny or others in a more indirect way. say, utilizing laws that were not necessarily related to their political activities, or banning them from holding gatherings, saying they did not have the correct permits. that is just one example. but now, attempting to declare navalny's organization as extremist, how much of a break is this from the tactics of the past? maria: i see this as a radical break. if we look at alexei navalny personally, for quite a while, for many years actually, the government obviously preferred

to have him at large man i -- at large than in jail. he was under house arrest, under administrative arrest. he was in jail for a while, but never too long. he was persecuted, prosecuted, constantly under pressure. however, in general, he remained at large. apparently the government thought that during that whole period that navalny would be more dangerous if he is jailed, that that would produce public outrage and people in the streets, and the government sought to avoid that. the turning point was this past summer when navalny was poisoned. whether this was an attempt to assassinate him or scare him away from his activities is impossible to say. however, that was certainly a turning point. followed by relocation to

germany. he returned despite many warnings he would be arrested, and he was indeed arrested. now he is in jail, and the government has full capacity to keep him in jail as long as it pleases. mohammed: alexander, we mentioned earlier that russia's financial monitoring agency has added navalny's network of regional campaign offices to a list of organizations involved in what they call terrorism and extremism. does that essentially make it impossible for alexei navalny's organization and his supporters to raise money going forward? alexander: for those legal entities enlisted in that list, so of course that makes it impossible to donate money. moreover, it puts under a big threat those who donate money, even ordinary citizens who donated a couple of bucks. absolutely legally.

they may be put into jail up to six years, if i am not mistaken. so the ordinary donation may end up with six years in prison. i am in the process of accepting donations for this organization, you may end up with eight to 10 years in prison. the terms are pretty much serious, and that puts under threat everyone who has been donating money in the past. but i think they have already closed all the bank accounts and they have already made everything on their account of navalny's stuff, everything on their account which was necessary to make it more or less safe for their supporters. i don't think the government will prosecute everyone who has been donating at least some amount of money, but i think that might be used against the

political activists who are, for instance, trying to run for elections. mohammed: michael, how formidable was this nationwide political infrastructure that navalny and his supporters had built up across the country? and is it, from your point of view, is it effectively destroyed now? michael: yeah, well, the strength that they had, and i think the strength they had over the regime was technological. the social media prowess, the views that were garnered by that video of putin was incredible. he probably felt he was playing catch up with navalny's movement, that they could not match that technological prowess. we see this happening around the world, including in china, where these regimes are putting pressure on social media companies, facebook, twitter, and others to crack down on their opponents. in the case of navalny in

russia, the contact is a big platform. we will not see the same game being played out as we have seen in china, where they go after western social media companies. they have a lot of leverage there. it is a big si -- a big setback. they do not have the ability to accommodate with mass media, so they use social media. if they are cut off from that, that is a huge setback for navalny and his movement. mohammed: maria, do members of the international community who support alexei navalny really know who he is? i ask this because a lot of the way he is represented, especially in the media in the west and other countries, it highlights the fact that he is a dissident, an activist, a lawyer, an opposition leader, but a lot of times it off -- it leaves off his ties to nationalist groups. maria: he did work with

nationalist groups in the past. i think he did that mostly out of solidarity with them because they were also persecuted and harassed by the authorities. he also as a politician saw potential. there is a time, which is actually over now, where nationalist sentiments ran high and nationalist groups had their rallies in moscow and elsewhere, but especially in moscow. as a politician, he saw the potential for support. if this is a sizable constituency, then he cannot ignore it. but all those contacts have long been in the past. and i think in general people in the west have a reasonably fair view of navalny. navalny is indomitable, unbending, a fighter like no one

else in russia. totally capable to raise his feat in russia.h was quite a he was totally ignored by a large art against media -- by a large audience media and was able to create an awareness of over half of russians. he also demonstrated he is unafraid and continued his crusade against corruption for years on end. he also has this amazing talent of explaining very complicated corruption schemes in an easy and funny way, which is also to his credit. i think his contacts and sympathies for nationalism is a tiny, tiny element in his long, long road to public awareness in russia. mohammed: alexander, what do you think? are there supporters of alexei navalny in russia that are troubled by his ties to

nationalism? alexander: i should be honest with you. a lot of people think i should be offended by his past because i come from a mixed family, but i am not because he has never expressed the ideas of having -- of shaming people like me or something like that. what maria described was quite well because that was a long time ago and while he never actually had any kind of nationalist movement, you should also bear in mind that the nationalist movement of 20 years ago in russia was not actually necessarily the nationalist in the nowadays understanding, because that was a bit different. it sometimes included people that were almost nazis, but the majority of them were normal people who were not happy with

the situation with the immigrants and who were not against the immigrants, but who were threatened by the fact that this situation was not controlled by the authorities and we had chaos and fear. i do not think this is good. this part of his past. but i also don't think this must be something bad, like puts lacrosse on his future in politics. mohammed: michael, alexei navalny is a darling in many countries in the west. the media really presents him in a very heroic way. world leaders talk about him very admiringly. in some sense, we have seen this kind of thing happen with w other oppositio fighters.

is this a similar narrative playing out here with what we are seeing with alexei navalny? michael: absolutely, and also there is the belarus opposition leader. that is one reason why navalny came back. he knew the threat he was being faced with, that he was afraid he would end up in the wilderness and perhaps branded as a foreign agent. the sad thing you mentioned, the diplomatic toolbox is very empty right now for the west. beyond sanctions, what else can they do? if i were a western policymaker, i would be confused out the moment on what the next move is. when it comes to navalny or when it comes to the brutal regime in myanmar or other places, i think rhetoric and statements of concern do not work anymore. you have to go through the hard

core stuff. what i mean by that in russia's case is removing them from the international financial system. it is the nuclear option, but i think it is the only way -- it is the only option where russia, the kremlin, is terrified of that happening to them. one more thing, if i may, i hate to say it, we are still in early days of the biden regime, but i think we are seeing obama 2.0 where a lot of tough rhetoric, don't do this, don't do that when it comes to russia, look what just happened on the ukrainian border. but there is a redline that they will not cross, and i think that putin has sensed that. he has tested the new biden administration and they think they can get away with quite a bit now. mohammed: maria, the fact that navalny is still making headlines even from behind bars, the fact that there are videos from him now from his last court appearance where he is criticizing vladimir putin, is this damaging in russia to putin

right now? maria: well, the damage is limited, and i should say that navalny's support in russia is also limited. his support is usually estimated by pollsters at 20%. we should not underestimate the way the broad public in russia is responsive to the kremlin line, that the west is there to do harm to russia in every possible way, and the west is using opponents to the regime as their instruments, that those who oppose the regime are either sponsored or funded or inspired or otherwise embedded by the west. it is not that everyone believes that, but there is a constituency that does, and there is a constituency that

remains in different to navalny and -- that remains in different to navalny and his allies. there are also those who believe troublemakers such as navalny --navalny is unique, but there are other troublemakers in russia -- that they are bound to make things worse, not better. there is a strong clinging to status quo in russia. the government is taking advantage of that. mohammed: alexander, what is next for the opposition movement in russia right now? is there a viable opposition leader, a viable opposition to putin at the moment? alexander: there are a lot of up opposition leaders within russia, but unfortunately they are not famous abroad. at the same time, i should admit that this new era of political pressure probably means that we will have less and less legal opportunities to stay in russia

and name ourselves opposition because it looks like sooner or later, or very soon, we will not be able to say that in an open way, that we are opposition, because that will immediately lead to a term in prison because the words are already being used as the tool to put people into prison. and moreover right now, the photos from the cameras around the city are being used to say, you have been in the city center on april 21 went there was illegal rallies, which means you should be fined. but if you have three finds, you go to prison. this is being used right now. although i don't pose any threats to the regime. i think people are on the eve of

a new era, a quite harsh and tough fair. i don't have a clear and easy answer as to what will happen next. i think first of all a lot of political leaders, opposition leaders, will have to end in russia. mohammed: michael, we don't have a lot of time left so i will ask you to keep your answer brief. at the end of the day, president putin remains firmly in control, is that right? michael: absolutely, and he does not only have the status at his disposal, but i am also worried about freelance elements in the security service or military that might act within russia to go after his opponents or feel they have license to go up to their opponents overseas as well. that is a very worrisome and chilling element and one that the west has to be cognizant of and keep surveillance over those elements, those allies of putin

that may go after bruton opponents not only in russia, but overseas as well -- go after putin opponents not only in russia, but overseas as well. mohammed: we have to end it there. thank you to all our guests. and thank you for watching. you can see this and all of our previous programs again by visiting our website, aljazeera.com. for more discussion, go to our facebook page, facebook.com/ajinsidestory. you can also join the conversation on twitter. the handle is @ajinsidestory. for the whole team, bye for now. ♪

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