Navalny's court case rescheduled

Prosecutors on Tuesday asked a Moscow court to fine jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny on charges of defaming a World War II veteran. Navalny rejects the accusations of slandering the veteran who was featured in a video last year promoting constitutional amendments that allowed an extension of President Vladimir Putin's rule.

During Tuesday's hearings at Moscow's Babushkinsky District Court, prosecutors asked the judge to order Navalny to pay a fine of 950,000 rubles (about $13,000) for slandering 94-year-old veteran Ignat Artemenko.Navalny contested the charge and concluded his remarks by jokingly asking the judge for a recipe for pickled cucumbers, saying there was no point discussing any legal issues.

The next court session is scheduled for Saturday.Speaking outside the court, Navalny's lawyer Olga Mikhailova criticised the court's handling of the case.

"The law has nothing to do with the situation around Navalny," she said.

Navalny, 44, an anti-corruption investigator and Putin's most prominent critic, was arrested last month upon returning from Germany, where he spent five months recovering from a nerve-agent poisoning that he blames on the Kremlin. Russian authorities deny this.

Earlier this month, a Moscow court sentenced Navalny to two years and eight months in prison for violating terms of his probation while recuperating in Germany.

The sentence stems from a 2014 embezzlement conviction that Navalny has rejected as fabricated and the European Court of Human Rights has ruled to be unlawful.