Navalny's widow accuses 'demonic' Putin of mocking the dead for refusing to release body

Yulia Navalnaya, the widow of the late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, on Saturday demanded that Russian authorities release his body for burial and accused a “demonic” Russian President Vladimir Putin of “torturing” his corpse.

In a six-minute video posted on YouTube, Navalnaya accused Putin of holding her husband’s body “hostage,” and questioned Putin’s often-professed Christian faith.

Navalny’s mother Lyudmila said on Friday that Russian investigators were refusing to release his body from a morgue in the remote Arctic city of Salekhard until she agreed to lay him to rest without a public funeral.

Russians on social media say officials do not want