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Russian President Vladimir Putin has denied the allegation that several agents of the Russian secret service FSB were instrumental in the poison attack on opposition politician Alexei Navalny. Research by SPIEGEL and international partners revealed this.
“But why the immediate poison? Who cares? If we had wanted that, we probably would have finished it too, ”Putin said in a video conference.
The Russian president described the reports as a “stunt” designed to attack Russia’s leadership. “This is not an investigation at all, but the legalization of US secret service documents,” Putin said. If Navalny “enjoys the support of the US secret services,” it means “that our secret services must deal with him,” Putin said.
The “Berlin patient” Navalny
This would show that Navalny “enjoys the support of the secret services of the United States.” Putin recently only referred to the opposition as a “Berlin patient” and did not name him.
According to revelations from SPIEGEL, investigative platforms Bellingcat and The Insider, as well as CNN, agents of the Russian secret service FSB observed Navalny for a long period of time. Immediately before Navalny’s poisoning, an FSB agent was in the vicinity of a hotel where Navalny may have come into contact with the Novichok neurotoxin.
The Kremlin critic collapsed shortly thereafter, on August 20, on a Russian domestic flight and, after an emergency landing, was treated for the first time in the Siberian Omsk. On August 22, he was flown to Germany for treatment at the Berlin Charité.
He was able to leave the clinic again in mid-September, he is still in Germany. According to the federal government, he was poisoned with a neurotoxin from the Novitschok group. This diagnosis has been confirmed by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).
Lavrov had already denied his participation
Navalny accuses Putin of being the mastermind behind the attack. Novichok nerve gas was developed during the Soviet era. The substance was also used to poison former Russian double agent Sergej Skripal in Britain in 2018.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov had already commented on the investigation on Tuesday and denied the involvement of Russian agents. “All of these reports are fun to read,” Lavrov said. The “way in which this news was presented says only one thing: that our Western partners lack ethical standards,” the chancellor said.
