MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 25th May, 2022) The Arbitration Court of the Moscow District on Monday upheld the decisions of two lower courts, which satisfied the claim of businessman Oleg Deripaska for the protection of his business reputation against jailed Russian opposition politician Alexey Navalny and ordered him to remove the videos defaming the plaintiff from YouTube.
The two courts previously ordered the opposition figure to retract the claims made in his YouTube videos about alleged state support in the form of subsidized loans or non-repayable grants provided to Deripaska's companies. The retraction should be made through publications in the Russian newspaper Kommersant within one month from the date when ruling goes into effect.
In addition, Navalny is obliged to delete both videos in question within one day and pay 1 ruble ($0.018) in compensation for moral damage. If the decision is not fulfilled, the opposition figure will have to pay 50,000 rubles for each day of non-fulfillment.
Alexei Melnikov, the lawyer who spoke on behalf of Deripaska in court, told Sputnik that the defendant's allegations have "nothing to do with freedom of speech," "they are malicious attacks on a prominent Russian businessman," and the information "has no factual basis."
In January 2021, Navalny was arrested in Moscow upon his arrival from Germany, where he received medical treatment for alleged poisoning in Russia. A court rescinded his suspended sentence in the 2014 Yves Rocher fraud case over multiple breaches of probation, and sentenced him to 2.5 years in prison.
In March 2022, Navalny was sentenced to additional nine years in prison for fraud and contempt of court.
