Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny has lost a case against Senator Dmitry Sablin, the Vedomosti newspaper reported Wednesday.
Sablin and his wife Alla Nalcha sought 10 million rubles ($125,000) in moral damages from Navalny, but the court ruled that Navalny pay Sablin 250,000 rubles as compensation for moral damages and to cover legal costs worth 158,000 rubles, according to the newspaper. The court dismissed the claims of Sablin's wife.
The lawsuit followed Navalny's accusations that the senator and one of the leaders of the so-called Anti-Maidan movement had earned money illegally.
In addition to financial compensation, Sablin demanded that these allegations be refuted.
In an online post published on Aug. 12, Navalny called the Anti-Maidan a “movement to protect the property of Senator Sablin, obtained through bribes and fraud by marrying the niece of the governor, who stole billions from the Moscow Region budget,” the newspaper quoted Navalny's statement as saying.
The post appeared soon after the Anti-Maidan movement asked Alexander Bastrykin, head of the Investigative Committee, to check Navalny's speeches for evidence of extremism.
