Navalny's Return/Imprisonment Boosts Public Distrust

LOCAL NEWS

• Local columnist says Navalny's return to Russia and imprisonment has only increased public distrust in him according to polls.
  • 55% didn't believe he was deliberately poisoned, and his trust ratings increased a mere 1% to 5% - before sliding back to 4%.
  • 17% said they believed the 'Putin's palace' video was true.
  • Columnist seemed Navalny-aligned, and cited a core scepticism within Russia's population towards anti-state actors, diminishing Navalny's likely impact on changing the regime in these upcoming elections
• Russia says 'equipment failure' on the Rostelecom network were behind govt website outages yesterday, not Twitter slowdown.
  • Comes after Carnegie Moscow Director said this may have been the result of US hacking threats but was never substantiated by other sources