Timothy Frye: Russia rising: Why Vladimir Putin can't ignore Alexei Navalny's revolution
Timothy Frye, the Marshall D. Shulman Professor of Post-Soviet Foreign Policy, published an article in NBC.
Putin’s immediate challenge is to deal with Navalny and the protests, but the broader and more difficult challenge will be to change the deeper currents driving opposition.
Alexei Navalny was poisoned by Russian state security officers and yet still chose to return. Predictably, he was arrested and sentenced to prison. This courageous act, coupled with the release of a damning video about President Vladimir Putin’s wealth and large protests across the country, have presented Putin with perhaps the greatest challenge to his 20-year presidency. That challenge culminated Tuesday in a Moscow courtroom with Navalny sentenced to more than two and a half years in a penal colony.