Another Day in Court for Alexey Navalny

Just before the Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny was sentenced to five years in prison,he stood up and addressed not just the nervous young judge but the bailiffs, the prosecutors in their sky-blue polyester uniforms, and the cameras. He had been convicted on a convoluted embezzlement charge involving a lumber company in the Kirov region called Kirovles. (The allegations were so complex that Navalny’s allies started simplifying the charge to “stealing a forest.”)

“Despite the fact that you put me here in the defendant’s seat, my colleagues and I will end up defending you against this feudal government,” Navalny said. “I declare that we will do everything in order to destroy this feudal system in Russia. ... We will not allow this bunch of freaks to continue to force our people to drink and decay in poverty.”

The judge ignored the impassioned last stand, read the