Moscow Press Corps Reacts with Shock, Despair to Navalny Conviction

With the conviction this morning of anti-corruption crusader Alexey Navalny on charges of embezzling $500,000 from a state-owned timber company, the Kremlin sent a strong message that it has little tolerance for dissent. Navalny’s five-year prison sentence was far harsher than expected and will likely scuttle his bid to run for mayor of Moscow this fall.

While Navalny will undoubtedly appeal Thursday’s ruling, his jailing smacks of a dangerous throwback to Soviet times. In short, Vladimir Putin’s government has eliminated its most significant political opponent by throwing him in jail on what appear to be trumped-up charges.

In the courtroom on Thursday, journalists covering the trial for Western news outlets were shocked and dismayed at the forceful ruling, and remarkably outspoken about its consequences. The entire episode played out live on Twitter:

several journalists are weeping. #unprecedented

— Nataliya Vasilyeva (@NatVasilyevaAP) July 18, 2013

I’ve been to two other ‘trials of the century" Khodorkovsky, Pussy Riot, but never have I seen so many reporters so angry w verdict.

— Nataliya Vasilyeva (@NatVasilyevaAP) July 18, 2013

i need a drink.

— Nataliya Vasilyeva (@NatVasilyevaAP) July 18, 2013

Navalny is being handcuffed in the courtroom. This is surreal.

— Miriam Elder (@MiriamElder) July 18, 2013

Despite Kremlin showing its true face over+over, hope always dies last here http://t.co/cCNmXiEjn8 Many thought this wouldn’t happen today.

— Miriam Elder (@MiriamElder) July 18, 2013

Many discussions of crossing Rubicons over the last year, but this is a real Rubicon, and it has been crossed.

— Ellen Barry (@EllenBarryNYT) July 18, 2013

There is real shock coming from participants in protest movement, dormant lately, and from journalists, even those who predicted.

— Ellen Barry (@EllenBarryNYT) July 18, 2013

If Snowden chooses today to emerge grinning from Sheremetevo with newly minted documents, the dark irony really will be complete. #Navalny

— Shaun Walker (@shaunwalker7) July 18, 2013

I was so wrong to think the Kremlin capable of any finesse in silencing #Navalny. Again it picks the trusty hatchet. so fucking awful

— Simon Shuster (@shustry) July 18, 2013

With today’s ruling, on Nelson Mandela’s 95th birthday, of all days, Russia’s foremost dissident has taken a decisive step toward spending the next five years of his life in jail — as the future of the protest movement he led hangs in the balance.