Alexei Navalny gets a memorial in Helsinki
A memorial event honoring Alexei Navalny took place in Helsinki on February 17, 2024, coinciding with the opening of the exhibition “Faces of the Russian opposition”. PHOTO: VALERY KLEPKIN
Aleksandr Trifonov
Published 06.02.2025 2:53
Updated 06.02.2025 3:05
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The Helsinki Municipality has approved the creation of a permanent memorial for Alexei Navalny, Russian opposition leader who died in prison on February 16, 2024. The decision was outlined in an official response dated January 21 from the Helsinki Urban Environment Department to the initiator of the project, the Civic organisation Initiative for Resistance and Dialogues (FoReDi ry).
The memorial will be a commemorative bench that will be placed near the Russian Embassy, within the Neitsytpuisto park. The specific location proposed by the department is at the end of a park alley leading to Tehtaankatu street, near the fence of the Russian embassy.
The bench will be constantly visible to the employees’ residence within the embassy compound, says Nikita Kirillov, the coordinator of FoReDi ry. Thus, it will not only serve as a as a commemorative site but also as a constant reminder to embassy staff of Alexei Navalny, whom almost all Russian opposition figures believe was deliberately killed by the Putin regime.
The Helsinki municipality placed the responsibility for the design, installation, and maintenance of the bench on the project’s initiators, FoReDi. It is a non-profit organisation founded in 2024 to oppose the Putin regime and foster dialogue among people with different political views. Its members include both Russian citizens, some of whom have received political asylum in Finland, and Finnish citizens.
According to Kirillov, FoReDi will try to involve Navalny’s supporters in designing the project. The activists hope that they could inaugurate the memorial on Navalny’s birthday, June 4.
Third Navalny memorial in the world
The bench in Helsinki will be the third official memorial site dedicated to Alexei Navalny worldwide. The first and only such site in Russia is Navalny’s grave at Borisovskoye Cemetery on the southeastern outskirts of Moscow.
The second one is located in Lisbon, Portugal. A stone plaque bearing Navalny’s name, dates of birth and death and a slogan “Do not give up” in Portuguese, Russian, and English, is installed 100 meters from the Russian embassy. This plaque was set up and unveiled in November 2024 by the Association of Free Russians in Portugal.
In Finland, several spontaneous memorial gatherings took place immediately after Navalny’s death. On the third day after his passing, in accordance with Orthodox tradition, the Finnish Orthodox Church held a memorial service (panikhida) at Helsinki’s Uspenski Cathedral for the newly departed servant of God, Alexis, as Navalny was a practicing Orthodox Christian. Around 200 people attended the service.
On February 19, a civic initiative was launched to collect signatures for renaming the park near the Russian Embassy in honor of Alexei Navalny. However, as Kirillov explains, under Finnish law, topographical objects (such as streets and parks) can be named after deceased individuals only as five years after their death, which made the idea unfeasible.