If the family does not agree to hold a secret funeral, Alexei Navalny's body will not be returned and will be buried in the penal colony where he died .

This is Moscow's ultimatum to the mother of the Russian dissident, Lyudmila . The woman, Navalny's team explains, was given a few hours to decide, but she would have already refused .

"An investigator" called her in the afternoon after the woman had rejected the first request for a private funeral on Thursday, citing blackmail and threats. Navalny's former spokesperson, Kira Yarmysh, said that the law "obliges the authorities to hand over the body within two days from the moment the cause of death is ascertained" .

According to the medical documentation signed by the mother which certifies the "natural" causes of death, Yarmysh added, "these two days expire today and she insists that the authorities allow the funeral and memorial ceremony to take place as usual." Opponent and former oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky , who lives abroad, said the Kremlin would like private funerals because it fears possible protests . According to him, a public funeral would be «dangerous for Putin in the context of the election campaign», because in this situation no one can predict what impact the event could have.

US President Joe Biden announced more than 500 new sanctions on Russia over Navalny's death, as well as intervention in Ukraine.

(Unioneonline/L)