MOSCOW, January 26. /TASS/. It is not the Kremlin’s prerogative to find blogger Alexey Navalny guilty, only a court which has already delivered guilty verdicts regarding this individual can do so, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists commenting on an interview of Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev with the Argumenty i fakty weekly.
"Only a court can find any Russian citizen guilty. We know that Navalny has already been repeatedly found guilty of crimes according to Russian laws and any further decisions can be made only by the court. This is not the Kremlin’s prerogative," he said.
In his interview, the Security Council secretary stated that the West needs Navalny in order to destabilize the situation in Russia. He also noted that this individual "has repeatedly grossly violated the Russian legislation being engaged in large-scale fraud," and, as a Russian citizen, should be held responsible for his illegal activities in accordance with the law.
On December 30, 2014, Moscow’s Zamoskvoretsky Court found the Navalny brothers guilty of embezzling Yves Rocher's funds and handed Alexey Navalny a three-and-a-half year suspended sentence, while Oleg Navalny was sentenced to 3 years and 6 months in a general-security colony.