US 'deeply concerned' by reports Navalny missing

The United States is concerned after allies of jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny said they had received no news of him or his whereabouts recently, the White House said Monday.

"We're deeply concerned by these reports that he's now been gone for allegedly a week and neither his representatives or his family know where he is," National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said.

"He should be released immediately, he should never have been jailed in the first place," Kirby told journalists traveling with US President Joe Biden aboard Air Force One on a trip to Philadelphia.


Kirby added: "We're going to work with our embassy in Moscow to see how much more we can find out."

Navalny's allies said on Monday they had been unable to locate him for six days, and that he had likely been transferred from the prison where he was serving a 19-year sentence on extremism charges.

A court this summer ordered to have him moved to a harsher "special regime" prison colony.

"We still do not know where Alexei is," his spokeswoman Kira Yarmysh said on social media.