By RFE/RL's Russian Service

ARKHANGELSK, Russia -- A court in Russia's northwestern city of Arkhangelsk has sentenced a former associate of jailed Russian opposition politician Aleksei Navalny to 30 months in prison on a charge of rehabilitating Nazism.

The court convicted and sentenced the former photographer for Navalny's team in Arkhangelsk, Ruslan Akhmetshin, on October 26.

The charge against Akhmetshin stemmed from his online post about the 1939 agreement between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany on dividing Poland between the two countries that led to the beginning of the World War II.

Akhmetshin was arrested in May at a Moscow airport as he was planning to leave Russia.

The Memorial Human Rights Center has recognized Akhmetshin as a political prisoner.