Russian authorities refuse to investigate Navalny's death, says his widow

Russian authorities have refused to launch a criminal investigation into the death of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in a penal colony in the Arctic, his widow Yulia said on Thursday.

Navalny, Russian President Vladimir Putin's fiercest political opponent, died in the remote northern penal colony in February while serving a 19-year sentence for extremism he condemned as politically motivated. Authorities said he fell ill after taking a walk but otherwise released no details about Navalny's death.

Russian authorities simply stated that Navalny died of natural causes shortly after a walk and vehemently denied any involvement in either the poisoning or his death.

In a video posted on social media on Thursday, Yulia Navalnaya, Navalny's widow, said she had received a letter from Russian investigators detailing the cause of her husband's death.

In the video, Navalnaya said she was told Navalny died from a combination of “a dozen different diseases.” Investigators told her Navalny ultimately died of cardiac arrhythmia, or an irregular heartbeat.

Navalnaya disputed Russian officials' portrayal of events and said her husband had shown no signs of heart disease during his lifetime.

The letter, said Navalnaya, was “a lie.”

“They are hiding what really happened that day… When Alexei became ill, he was not taken to the infirmary, but back to the punishment cell.”

There, she said, Navalny “died alone.”

The document said the authorities would not launch a criminal investigation into the opposition leader's death because no crime had been committed, Navalnaya said.

“As long as Putin is in power, there will be no investigation,” Navalnaya said, vowing to continue investigating the circumstances of her husband’s death.