MOSCOW, January 14. /TASS/. Russian opposition figure Alexey Navalny has been declared wanted after he missed several criminal inspection registrations as a person under suspended sentence for the Yves Rocher case, the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service told reporters.

"In light of the fact that the real place of residence of the convicted person has been unknown <…> since September 24, initial inquiry measures were launched against Navalny A. on November 27, 2020. Convicted Navalny A. was placed on the wanted list on December 29 with an instruction to detain him when his whereabouts are identified," the statement reads.

The agency underlined that it is guided by the principle of inevitability of punishment and equality for all Russian citizens and due to "Navalny’s repeated violations" of laws the service’s Moscow office is "obligated to take all measures to detain perpetrator Navalny until the court’s decision to change the suspended conviction for a real one."

The Federal Penitentiary Service recalled that the opposition figure had been placed on probation for five years.

Navalny’s criminal cases

Russian investigators have initiated a criminal case against Navalny over charges of embezzling 356 mln rubles ($4.7 mln) out of over 588 mln rubles ($7.9 mln) in donations to a number of his organizations, including the Anti-Corruption Foundation. According to investigators, Navalny and some other individuals spent this sum for personal purposes: purchase of personal property, material valuables and payment for expenses, including vacations abroad. Therefore, the money collected from citizens, was embezzled.

In July 2013, Navalny was found guilty of embezzling the funds of Kirovles company in western Russia’s Kirov Region and was handed a five-year sentence in a general colony as part of the embezzlement case. However, the prosecutors challenged the decision on Navalny’s custody, motivating this by the fact that he had been registered as a candidate for the Moscow mayor and this would be an obstacle for his campaigning. The next day Navalny walked free before the sentence took effect. In October 2013, the Kirov district court handed a five-and four-year suspended sentence to Navalny.

On December 30, 2014, Moscow’s Zamoskvoretsky Court found the Navalny brothers guilty of embezzling Yves Rocher's funds and sentenced Alexey Navalny to a suspended sentence of 3 years and 6 months, while Oleg Navalny was sentenced to 3 years 6 months in a general-security colony.