Navalny asks the court to interrupt ongoing prison raids

Speaking in court on a video connection from prison, Navalny said he has done nothing to justify the authorities' decision to consider it an escape risk, the reason why these raids are made. I just want them not to come wake me at night,” he told the judge in comments that were broadcast by independent Dozhh television. “What I did: Have I tried to get out? Did I dig a underpass? Or was I robbing someone's gun? Explain why they call me escape risk! ”

He argued that every hour at night “actually constitutes torture”, telling the judge that “would go crazy for a week” if you submitted to such a frequent awake. The court later postponed the session for Wednesday. Navajo, Russian President Vladimir Putin's staunchest political enemy, was arrested in January after returning from Germany, where he had spent five months recovering from a poisoning with a nervous agent for whom he blames the Kremlin - charges Russian officials dismiss.

In February, he was given a two-and-a-half-year sentence for violating the terms of a sentence resulting from a 2014 sentence, which he says was politically motivated. He began a 24-day hunger strike in prison to protest the lack of medical treatment for severe back pain and numbness in his legs, ending last month after receiving the medical care he sought.

While still on a hunger strike, Navajo moved from a criminal object east of Moscow, where he was serving his sentence to the hospital of another prison in Vladimir, a town 80 miles [180 km] east of the capital. He continues to be in that prison, where he said night checks continued, although they were less disturbing.

While Navalny is in prison, prosecutors have asked a court in Moscow to define his Foundation for Combating Corruption and its network of regional offices as extremist groups. A draft law, which has quickly passed into the lower house of the Kremlin-controlled Russian parliament, blocks members, donors and supporters of extremist groups from seeking public office. The parallel moves are widely seen as an attempt not to allow Navajo collaborators to run in the September parliamentary elections.