 Putin's opponents expect to be hunted at home and abroad after election. Allies of late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny have suggested that Vladimir Putin could be vulnerable following his re-election, although dissidents expressed fear that repression of opponents could become even more brutal. According to iNews media outlet, the president returned to power with more than 87% of the vote in an election widely derided as a sham. Leonid Volkov, chief of staff at the Anti-Corruption Foundation, founded by Navalny, said that the inflated vote share for Putin would give him a false sense of confidence. Dictators, such as Romania's Nikolai Shalshescu, were deposed shortly after sweeping victories in compromised elections. Noted Mr. Volkov, who was recently assaulted outside his home in Lithuania in an attack he attributed to the Russian regime. Dictators with huge percentages often have a bad end, said Volkov in a video address. The greater the demonstration of people's love, the less love there is. Julia Navalny, Navalny's widow, issued a message calling on followers to keep fighting in the aftermath of the vote, urging them not to brush off work because it doesn't immediately lead to the results, but to have patience and move forward. Daniel Ken, head of the Teachers' Alliance Trade Union affiliated to the Navalny network, told that he took encouragement from the Noon Against Putin campaign, in which supporters converged on polling stations at noon on Sunday to vote for opposition candidates. About 200,000 people took part, and millions more saw the action on TV, he claimed. We will try to come up with new original ideas, said Ken. Paris, preparing to deploy troops to Ukraine, battle of Russian and French soldiers expected there. France is preparing its forces for deployment to Ukraine, the head of Russia's foreign intelligence, service Sergei Naryshkin, claimed in a statement. Paris, allegedly, seeks to send as many as 2,000 troops to Ukraine, he said. French President Emmanuel Macron said last month that he cannot exclude the possibility of Western soldiers being sent to aid Kiev in its fight against Moscow, branding Russia an adversary while denying Paris was waging war against it. Russia's military and top officials have repeatedly pointed to the presence of French mercenaries already fighting for Kiev on the ground. In mid-January, the Russian Defence Ministry said that more than 60 foreigners, predominantly French, nationals had been killed in a high precision strike against a temporary assembly point of foreign fighters. In the statement, the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service chief said the French armed forces had become concerned about the rising number of French nationals dying in Ukraine. According to the spy chief, the French military is worried about the government's plans to send the contingent to Ukraine, considering that such an operation would be difficult to conduct without Russia noticing. The French soldiers would indeed become a legitimate priority target for attacks by the Russian armed forces. The claims come as the chief of staff of the French Army, General Pierre Schill, said in an interview that France is prepared to take part in the toughest engagements militarily and is ready to face any international developments. He added that Paris could assemble a division of 20,000 troops within 30 days and an army of 60,000 by joining with divisions from other NATO allies. Schill said France has international responsibilities and is linked by defence agreements to states exposed to major threats and must therefore have its forces trained and interoperable with allied armies. He added that nuclear deterrence is not a universal guarantee because it does not guard against conflicts that would remain below the threshold of vital interests. Schill said that the army must show itself a credible force through responsiveness in terms of force projection and the ability to carry out operations of increased scope. Russian President Vladimir Putin has also claimed that Western mercenaries, including French nationals, are dying in Ukraine in large numbers. Commenting on a potential NATO deployment to Ukraine, the President also warned that this would be one step shy of a full-scale World War III.