MOSCOW—Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny was freed from jail pending appeal Friday, in a surprise move a day after he was convicted of embezzlement and sentenced to five years in prison.
Mr. Navalny's supporters in Leninsky District Court in Kirov burst into applause following the judge's decision to let the 37-year-old anticorruption blogger and his co-defendant Petr Ofitserov go free.
Immediately after the ruling, the two men were allowed to step out of a glass-enclosed defendant's box and Mr. Navalny hugged his wife.
"This decision was quite unexpected for us," Mr. Navalny said, thanking the thousands of protesters who had taken to the streets in Moscow and elsewhere on Thursday after his conviction. "What is happening now is a unique thing for the Russian justice system."
[h=3]Russia's Full-Court Press[/h]The Russian government has launched a number of investigations alleging criminal activity by opposition groups, ranging from fraud to money-laundering and, in one recent case, a massive theft of fur hats.
WSJ
The decision came after the prosecutor had argued that Russia's criminal code didn't allow for Messrs. Navalny and Ofitserov to be jailed during the appeal process as the sentence isn't valid until that is over. The judge agreed.
Mr. Navalny was convicted on Thursday of conspiring to embezzle 16 million rubles ($494,000) from a state-controlled timber company in Kirov—600 miles east of Moscow—while serving as an informal adviser there in 2009.
Mr. Navalny had called the case politically motivated and his conviction was met with condemnation from governments around the world. White House spokesman Jay Carney called it part of a "disturbing trend of government actions aimed at suppressing dissent in civil society in Russia."
Thursday's court verdict came a day after Mr. Navalny officially registered as a candidate for Moscow's snap mayoral election in September. As he was set free, he said he was still considering whether to continue running for the post.
"I will decide whether to participate in the elections after I come back home to Moscow and visit my headquarters," he said.
Mr. Navalny was the most charismatic new face to come out of the large-scale demonstrations that exploded in the wake of parliamentary elections in late 2011.
He accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of running a "party of crooks and thieves," a slogan that became the rallying cry of the anti-Kremlin movement.
For many, he was seen as the leader with the best chance to broaden the opposition's appeal beyond Moscow's urban elite. But the movement has struggled since last year amid fair-weather support and a crackdown by authorities that has landed many of its leaders in court.
Write to Lukas I. Alpert at [email protected]
