Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny called on Russians to take to the streets in mass protests after a court ordered Monday that he be held in custody for 30 days after his return to Russia. He said Monday’s abrupt court hearing, to which a handful of pro-Kremlin media were admitted, was a sign of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s fear and weakness. “They are afraid of you,” he said in a video message after the verdict, calling Putin’s regime a gang of monstrous crooks. “They are afraid and that is why they do things urgently and secretly. “So I appeal to you: Don’t keep quiet. Resist! Take to the streets! No one can protect us but ourselves, and there are so many of us that if we want to achieve something, we will achieve it.” International pressure mounted for Navalny’s release as he was abruptly summoned to the hearing, which he described as “the highest degree of lawlessness.” His lawyers said they were given just minutes’ notice of the hearing. Navalny faces another hearing Jan. 29 over prison authorities’ claims that he violated conditions set down in a three-and-a-half-year suspended jail sentence relating to a 2014 embezzlement conviction, a case Navalny and the European Court of Human Rights have called a political prosecution.
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