Is the Greatest Threat to Putin Really Alexei Navalny?

The Inquiry

• Episode: Is the Greatest Threat to Putin Really Alexei Navalny?
• Website: The Inquiry
• Feed URL: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p029399x/episodes/downloads.rss
• Duration: 00:22:57
• Published: 2017-06-15 04:30

On 12 June 2017 thousands of protesters took to the streets in over 160 towns and cities across Russia. Opposition leader Alexei Navalny called on people to march against corruption from Kaliningrad in the west to Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk in the east, in bustling cities and significantly, in rural towns where support for President Putin is strong. This is unusual. Protests are usually restricted to the urban elites in Moscow. So who is Navalny and how has he managed to bring so many people out on the streets?

Our expert witnesses assess the strength of the opposition movement in Russia. They explain that the protests reveal a greater threat to Putin. The mobilisation of a young generation who do not believe what they see on state TV and are turning to opposition politics online instead.

Presenter: Ruth Alexander Producers: Phoebe Keane and Estelle Doyle

(Photo: Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny speaks during a rally in Lyublino, a suburb of Moscow, 20 September 2015. Credit: Getty Images)