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MOSCOW, September 3 / TASS /. Russian opposition blogger Alexei Navalny may have been exposed to a Novichok family nerve agent only at the Berlin-based Charite clinic, where he is receiving treatment, and accusations about Russia’s involvement run counter to common sense, said a Russian legislator on Wednesday.
“Once they have found something related to Novichok, it is most likely that he was exposed to him in this clinic,” Andrei Lugovoi, a member of the security and anti-corruption committee in the lower house of parliament of the State Duma, told TASS. Russia. “A nurse or a doctor could have done that if they really wanted to somehow expose Navalny to a toxic agent. I’m sure this is what really happened.”
According to the legislator, it is absolutely illogical to claim that Navalny was poisoned by Novichok in Russia. “I rate the probability of such a scenario as zero from a common sense point of view; it is absolutely illogical to poison a man and then send him to Germany so that they can find out that he was poisoned,” he said. “If it were done at the state level, a way would have been found to avoid and explain it.”
He described the situation as yet another provocation by outside forces and a “brilliant story” to discredit German-Russian relations. He did not rule out that Berlin may have been misled about the Navalny poisoning. “First of all, we must demand that Germany share all the documents it has on this case. The Russian attorney general’s office is doing it,” Lugovoi stressed.
He also dismissed as unrealistic the possibility of Navalny’s opponents not linked to government agencies gaining access to a Novichok-type agent.
Navalny felt ill on August 20 while flying from Tomsk to Moscow and the plane made an emergency landing in Omsk. The man was taken to hospital in a coma and was hooked up to a ling ventilator. He was airlifted to the Berlin-based Charite clinic on the morning of August 22. Doctors said indicators of poisoning had been found on his body. According to doctors, the symptoms of poisoning have gradually diminished.
On Wednesday, the German government said that German military toxicologists had discovered that Navalny had been exposed to a nerve agent from the Novichok family. Berlin asked Moscow to clarify the circumstances of the incident and promised to inform the Russian ambassador about the results of Navalny’s sample tests. German cabinet spokesman Steffen Seibert said Germany will notify the European Union, NATO and the OPCW of the latest information on the Navalny case and “will discuss an appropriate joint response with partners in light of the Russian response.” . However, he did not elaborate on the measures that could be taken.
Russian President Dmitry Peskov’s press secretary previously said that Russia was ready for comprehensive cooperation with Germany to clarify the situation around the Russian blogger. He noted that no toxic agent had been identified before Navalny was taken to Berlin. Russia’s Foreign Ministry said Moscow continued to wait for Germany to respond to the investigation by the Russian attorney general’s office.
Russia has repeatedly said it is interested in a full investigation of the incident. A source told TASS that Russian forensic experts had not found poisonous or toxic chemicals either in Navalny’s body or in his belongings. Furthermore, during an investigation, the police found no evidence that Navalny had intentionally suffered bodily harm.
