Alexei Navalny

Alexei Anatolievich Navalny is a noted Russian lawyer and political activist, known as much for his crusade against corruption as for his opposition to Russian President Vladimir Putin. Beginning his career in law at the age of twenty-one, he joined Russian United Democratic Party Yabloko at twenty-three, and earned his degree in economics at twenty-four. He co-founded a new political movement called ‘The People’ at thirty-one. At the age of thirty-two, he emerged as an activist shareholder, establishing Union of Minority Shareholders in the same year, eventually launching other platforms like RosPil (2010) and RosYama (2011). At thirty-five, he intensified his movement, urging voters not to vote for the country’s main political party, ‘United Russia’, very soon leading protests against fraudulent election processes, which in turn led to his arrest and international fame. Since then, he has been indicted in several fraud cases, resulting in long periods of house arrests and jail terms as well as being barred from contesting for the post of Russian president.