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RUSSIA-POLITICS-APPEAL-NAVALNY
Moscow appeal court upholds Navalny prison sentence
MOSCOW, Feb 20, 2021 (BSS/AFP) – A Moscow appeal court on Saturday upheld a prison sentence imposed on chief Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny after he returned to Russia from Germany last month.
Judge Dmitry Balashov rejected Navalny’s appeal of the February 2 ruling, which turned a 2014 suspended sentence on embezzlement charges into real jail time.
The judge decided to count six weeks Navalny was under house arrest as part of the time served, so he will now be imprisoned for just over two-and-a-half years in a penal colony.
BSS/AFP/MMA/1642HRS