Alexei Navalny appears via video link for appeal hearing

Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny, the man many see as the main challenger to Russian President Vladimir Putin's power, on Thursday appeared at a legal hearing via video link.

It is the first time he has been seen in public since announcing the end of a weekslong hunger strike in jail. 

Earlier in the day, his team said it was officially disbanding its campaign offices across the country. A court hearing, reportedly on May 17, will consider a request from prosecutors to class Navalny's organization as extremist.

What happened in court?

Navalny appeared at an appeal hearing connected with a defamation sentence he received in February for insulting a World War II veteran.

"I was taken to a bathhouse yesterday [...] there was a mirror there; I looked at myself — I am just a horrible skeleton," Navalny told the court, according to an audio recording released by the independent Dozhd television channel.

Images from the courtroom showed the opposition leader looking gaunt and with a shaved head.

In a statement to the court, Navalny criticized Putin as an "emperor" with no clothes.

"I would like to say, my dear court, that your emperor is naked. And it is not just a little boy shouting this around, that the emperor is naked," he said.

"There is a crown that slips over the ears. There are tons of lies on television. And there is, of course, huge personal wealth," Navalny added.

The court upheld the ruling against the opposition leader, ordering him to pay fines totaling 850,000 rubles (€9,420; $11,400).

His legal team said they would take the case to the European Court of Human Rights.

Navalny aides also claim a seperate criminal case has been opened up against the Kremlin critic. Russia's authorities reportedly claim Navalny set up a non-profit organization that infringes on the human rights and civil liberties of the Russian people. 

Why is Navalny in prison?

Navalny's current prison sentence has drawn criticism from around the world.

He was arrested in January upon his return from Germany, where he had been convalescing for five months after an attempted poisoning with a nerve agent. He blames the poisoning on the Kremlin, but government officials have denied responsibility.

He was sentenced to 2 1/2 years' imprisonment at a penal camp in early February for violating parole requirements related to an earlier suspended sentence over 2014 embezzlement charges. He could not meet the terms of the sentence, under which he was meant to show up for regular appointments with the Russian prison service, because he was receiving medical treatment in Germany.

He says the embezzlement charges were politically motivated.

While in prison, he began a hunger strike to demand proper medical care for leg and back pain. He said on April 23 that he would start gradually ending it after he was seen by doctors.

Why is his organization being targeted?

While campaigning to run against Putin in the 2018 presidential election, Navalny set up a network of offices in dozens of regions to promote his cause. Although he was eventually was barred from running, the offices remained and have continued investigating graft by local officials, among other things.

Russian prosecutors have now requested that Navalny's foundation be classified as an extremist organization, together with groups such as "Islamic State" and the Jehovah's Witnesses.

Critics see the legal proceedings against the foundation as an effort by the Putin regime to sideline a major threat to the president's power.

Ivan Zhdanov, the head of Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation, said in a Youtube broadcast Thursday that the organization's activities will not cease, even if a court rules the group is extremist.

Leonid Volkov, the head of the foundation's regional offices, said on Telegram Thursday the "network of Navalny's headquarters" would be disbanded, claiming work under the current conditions is "impossible." At the same time, he said the foundation's activities could resume under the auspices of various independent, political organizations.

tj, wd/rt (Reuters, AP, AFP)