Alexei Navalny is getting under the Kremlin’s skin

Only half a year ago the opposition leader Alexei Navalny was a non-person on Russian state media, and Putin’s opulent palace built on the Black Sea was largely unheard of inside the country. Navalny had his loyal base of supporters who followed him on YouTube, and the palace had been discussed in the West for a decade. But for the overwhelming majority of Russians, both were unknown.

Today, Navalny is everywhere on the Russian media. Vladimir Putin himself may still not be willing to name ‘that man’ – which after a certain point begins to look downright strange – but the President’s loyal army of pundits, news anchors and state journalists have leapt into the fray. Navalny has been called everything from a US-funded subversive to a ‘political paedophile’ – a reference to the fact that even children have heeded his call to protest. The Russian media are no longer pretending Navalny doesn’t exist.