1200 miles northeast of Moscow

Putin wins again.

Russia’s most prominent opposition leader Alexei Navalny collapsed and died on Friday after a walk at the “Polar Wolf” Arctic penal colony where he was serving a long jail term, the Russian prison service said.

Navalny, a 47-year-old former lawyer, rose to prominence more than a decade ago with blogs on what he said was vast corruption and opulence among the “crooks and thieves” of Russia’s elite.

The Federal Penitentiary Service of the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District said in a statement that Navalny felt unwell after a walk at the IK-3 penal colony in Kharp, about 1,900 km (1,200 miles) north east of Moscow into the Arctic Circle.

Putin is thinking it certainly took him long enough to “feel unwell” up there in the freezer. He was supposed to croak long before this.

Western officials paid tribute to his courage as a fighter for freedom. Some, without citing evidence, bluntly accused the Kremlin.

Without citing evidence? We already have the evidence: it’s been public all along. Navalny was kidnapped and shipped off to the Arctic because he resisted Putin.

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