MOSCOW, February 3 (RAPSI) – Prosecutors asked the Leninsky District Court of Kirov on Friday to give Russian opposition politician Alexey Navalny a 5-year suspended sentence and a fine for embezzlement at the Kirovles timber company, Navalny’s spokeswoman Kira Yarmysh wrote on her Twitter account.
Prosecutors also demanded a 4-year suspended sentence and a fine for another defendant in the case Pyotr Ofitserov.
On Wednesday, the court imposed travel restrictions on Navalny and his accomplice Ofitserov. According to the court order, they are prohibited from leaving Kirov until February 10.
In November, Russia's Supreme Court overturned sentences against Navalny and his accomplice Pyotr Ofitserov in Kirovles embezzlement case and sent it for retrial. The Supreme Court delivered the ruling taking into consideration the judgment of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).
In February 2016, ECHR held that the applicants’ right to a fair trial had been violated and ordered Russian authorities to compensate Navalny with €48,000 of legal costs and Ofitserov with €22,000. Additionally, Russia was obliged by court to pay 8,000 euro each in damages.
Russia’s Justice Ministry filed a request seeking referral of the case to the Grand Chamber of the Strasbourg Court, but the request was dismissed.
Navalny was given a five-year suspended sentence for embezzlement at the Kirovles timber company in July 2013. In May, Moscow's Lyublinsky District Court increased a probation period for him to 5.5 years. Ofitserov received a four-year suspended sentence.
According to investigators, while serving on a voluntary basis as an adviser to the Kirov Region governor Navalny organized the theft of over 10,000 cubic meters of timber from Kirovles company between May and September 2009.
Investigators claimed that Pyotr Ofitserov, then Director of Vyatka Timber Company, and Kirovles CEO Vyacheslav Opalyov were involved in the scheme. Proceedings against Opalyov were treated as a separated criminal case after he had admitted his guilt.
