[ad_1]
The Berlin State Criminal Police Office tightened its security precautions for Russian opposition politician Alexej Navalny. After a joint investigation by SPIEGEL and the Bellingcat research platform, both the number of deployed officers and the density of controls increased around Navalny, who was being treated at the Berlin Charité on August 20 after his poisoning. You will now be monitored directly at the hospital.
The move is a response to the constant improvement in Navalny’s health. While the Charité announced on Monday that he had been awakened from an artificial coma and that he was accessible, he is said to have made further progress in the meantime.
This makes it clear that the Berlin police want to prevent further assassination attempts. If Nawalny’s condition continues to improve, he can be expected to receive more visitors. According to information from Bellingcat and DER SPIEGEL, Navalny is said to be able to speak again and can probably recall details before his collapse aboard a plane from Tomsk in Siberia to Moscow. His statements could be dangerous to the people behind the attack.
According to the federal government, Navalny had been attacked with the Novichok neurotoxin before collapsing aboard the plane on August 20. According to information from SPIEGEL, the German security authorities assume that it was an operation by a Russian secret service against Navalny. Navalny is one of Russia’s best-known opposition politicians and is considered an intimate enemy of President Vladimir Putin.
According to analyzes by a special Bundeswehr laboratory, a variant of the Russian nerve agent Novitschok was used for the attack, which is even more toxic than the substance with which the former Russian agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter were poisoned in 2018. The attack a Skripal was carried out by a command of the Russian military intelligence service GRU.
The substance used against Navalny, as reported by representatives of various authorities in confidential conversations this week, could only be produced in a special military laboratory in Russia. This is why Chancellor Angela Merkel made such harsh comments last week.
After it emerged that Navalny had been poisoned with Novitschok, Merkel said questions now arose “that only the Russian government can answer.” At the same time, the Federal Foreign Ministry summoned the Russian ambassador.
Now a debate has broken out over sanctions against Russia. A construction freeze on the Russian-German Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline is even being discussed.
Russian authorities deny any responsibility for a possible poison attack on Navalny. A Novichok poisoning could have taken place more in Germany, it was even suggested by the official side, as Navalny had allegedly not been found to be poisoned in the course of his treatment in an Omsk hospital.
