The trained economist gave up her job to raise the couple's two children.
Warsaw, Poland:
Stone-faced and determined, Yulia Navalnaya took the baton from her late husband Alexei on Monday with a call to action for Russia's opposition after years in his shadow.
In a dimly lit room, her light blonde hair pulled back into her usual bun, the 47-year-old addressed the opposition, which has become leaderless after Navalny's death.
“I call on you to stand with me,” she said in a powerful nine-minute video that garnered around two and a half million views in just a few hours.
Her husband has been Putin's harshest critic for more than a decade, taking on the long-time ruler and denouncing the regime's corruption.
The two met while on vacation in Turkey and both said they fell in love immediately.
An economist by training, Navalnaya quit her job to raise the couple's two children.
But she stayed away from the media spotlight and maintained as much privacy as possible while Alexei's political career took off.
She stood by him as he sparked mass protests in Russia and flew with him out of the country when he was in a coma after being poisoned in 2020.
Five months later she was defiant as the couple flew back to Moscow, knowing it would land him in prison.
“Waiter, bring us some vodka, we're flying home,” Navalnaya said in a video of himself sitting next to Alexei on the plane, copying a scene from a Russian cult film.
“Nearest and most loved person”
The couple were separated upon landing at passport control, the last time she saw her husband at large.
They hugged briefly before the police took him away and she was greeted at the airport with shouts of “Yulia!”
The couple often shared photos from their family life with their children – in stark contrast to Putin, who keeps his private life completely secret.
They last saw each other in February 2022 and only spoke through letters because prison visits were banned.
She had since held on to the hope that she would see him again, even though he was sentenced to 19 years in prison and sent to the toughest prison ever.
But on Friday, Russian penal authorities announced that the Kremlin critic had died after more than three years behind bars.
Navalnaya, who was at the Munich Security Conference, made the comments shortly after the announcement.
“If this is true, then I want Putin and his entire entourage, Putin’s friends and his government to know: They will bear responsibility for what they did to our country, to my family, to my husband.”
“Fight harder”
Hopes were finally dashed when Navalny's team confirmed the opposition leader's death on Saturday.
“Putin killed the father of my children. “Putin took away the most expensive thing I had, the closest and most beloved person,” Navalnaya said on Monday.
She had witnessed her husband being arrested, poisoned and abused over the years.
Navalny always joked that this made her views more radical than his.
“If you are not a politician, but you see the worst things happening against your family, then of course you become radicalized,” Navalny said in an interview.
Navalnaya had nevertheless insisted that she was first and foremost a mother and wife and had no interest in entering politics.
But many observers wondered whether there was anyone else who could unite the divided opposition that once revolved around him.
And after decades of resisting calls to take a more active political role, Navalnaya agreed to pick up the torch.
“The most important thing we can do for Alexei and for ourselves is to continue to fight more desperately and harder than before,” she said.
“I know, it seems like nothing is possible anymore. But we must all come together in a strong fist and use it to defeat this crazy regime.”
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)