Jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny urged his supporters to show their opposition to the Russian government after a court sentenced him to nine years in prison on Tuesday for fraud and contempt.

The 45-year-old was already serving a two-and-a-half year sentence at a prison camp east of Moscow for parole violations related to charges that he says were fabricated to thwart his political ambitions.

His existing sentence will be incorporated into the one handed down on Tuesday, said his lawyers, both of whom were briefly detained after the hearing.

After the sentence was pronounced, President Vladimir Putin’s most prominent critic reacted on Twitter: “I want to say: the best support for me and other political prisoners is not sympathy and kind words, but actions. Any activity against the deceitful and thievish Putin's regime. Any opposition to these war criminals.”

4 Ukraine journalists ‘abducted’

Russian armed forces on Monday took four Ukrainian media workers from their homes in Melitopol, a city in southeastern Ukraine, the National Union of Journalists of Ukraine said in a news release.

The journalists and some of their family members were driven from the city — which is under Russian military occupation — towards an unknown direction before they were released a few hours later.

The journalists were all associated with the Melitopolskie Vedomosti, a local newspaper. They included the paper’s retired publisher, Mykhailo Kumko; its editor-in-chief, Yevhenia Boryan; and two reporters, Yulia Olkhovska and Lyubov Chaika.

New York Times News Service