Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who is stranded in a remote Arctic Circle prison, has claimed that he is forced to wake up at 5am every morning to the sound of the country’s national anthem, before he’s made to listen to a pro-Putin pop anthem.
Navalny, 47, is one of Vladimir Putin’s most high-profile domestic critics and is behind bars in the IK-3 penal colony in the town of Kharp in the Yamal-Nenets region around 1,200 miles northeast of Moscow.
In April 2023, an ally close to the opposition politician claimed he may have been poisoned with a slow-reacting agent whilst in prison. The incident reportedly left him in a “critical” condition.
Now it has emerged Navalny is being subjected to a pop tune every single morning at the crack of dawn. The song, performed by Yaroslav Dronov, stage name Shaman, is called “I’m Russian” and is fiercely pro-Putin.
Taking to X, formerly Twitter, Navalny said: “The singer Shaman appeared on stage when I was already imprisoned, so I could neither see nor listen to his music. But I know that he is now Putin’s main singer. And he has the most popular song: ‘I’m Russian’”.
In the thread he told his 2.9 million followers: “Everyone knows it, parodies of it are recorded, and so on. Of course, I was certainly curious to listen, but where in the prison I could do it? And then I was taken to Yamal.
“And here, every day at 5 o’clock in the morning, we hear the command: ‘Wake up!’, followed by the Russian national anthem. Immediately afterward, the country’s second most important song is played – I’m Russian by Shaman,” he wrote.
The chorus of the pop anthem is: “I’m Russian. I’ll fight to the end/ I’m Russian, my father’s blood flows in me, hey-hey/ I’m Russian and I’m lucky with this fact/ I’m Russian to spite the whole world.”
Navalny is a former lawyer and came to the public’s attention over ten years ago after mocking the Russian leader’s and alleging political corruption.
After being arrested upon returning to Russia three years ago, he was arrested and sent to prison on charges of extremism. He is serving a 19-year sentence.
