Putin critic Navalny detained by police before pre-election rally

The leader is a prominent critic of President Vladimir Putin

Outspoken Russian opposition leader and a prominent critic of President Vladimir Putin, Alexey Navalny, was arrested on Friday as he left his house for a rally.

Navalny, who is seeking to run against Putin in the 2018 presidential elections, was scheduled to travel to the city of Nizhny Novgorod to address supporters, reports Efe news.

"I left my house to go to the station and they arrested me in the doorway. Like in the films. A car pulled up and police got out. They're taking me to the station," Navalny wrote on his Instagram page moments after the event.

The leader has been detained several times by Russian police and has spent time in prison on charges of organising un-sanctioned protests, the last time being a 30-day sentence between June and July.

A lawyer and an activist, Navalny founded his Anti-Corruption Foundation in 2011 to investigate alleged corruption in Russian politics.

His outspoken criticism of Putin and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has earned him enemies and in April he was attacked by assailants who threw toxic brilliant green solution at his face.

Navalny required surgery on his eye to prevent him from going blind.

The opposition leader has continued to campaign for his candidacy in the March 2018 elections despite being ruled out of the running because of embezzlement convictions against him.

Navalny maintains that those charges were purely political and were only drawn up especially to blacklist him from the election race.