Can Putin mix nerve poison into anyone’s tea with impunity?

If given in the correct amount, it causes death almost immediately. But even if the dose is not fatal, the victim suffers permanent damage to health. Once in the body, the person begins to have cramps, then stops breathing, loses consciousness, and sometimes has bouts of vomiting.

A neurotox called Rookies was developed by the Soviets in the 1970s and 1980s and demonstrated Alexei Navalny on a Russian opposition leader who unexpectedly fell ill on a plane on August 20 and has been in a coma ever since.

The politician is currently being treated in Germany, where he has been shown to be poisoned. It is not entirely clear who did it and why, but most do. Vladimir Putin and point to the Russian government. Newbies are not something that can be easily obtained from a pharmacy, they need a great deal of experience to harm someone, and there has never been an example in history of trying to liquidate the enemies of the Russian elite in this way.

Although Navalny survived, it is still unpredictable if he will ever make a full recovery. The Kremlin’s reaction, however, was predictable: what kind of poisoning? They ask. However, under the circumstances, it is difficult to imagine that the Russian regime would not be involved in the assassination attempt, even if it will likely never achieve certainty.

Moments of poisoning

On the morning of August 20, Navalny boarded a plane from Tomsk to Moscow. He hadn’t eaten anything that day, he had just had a cup of tea at the airport. About half an hour after takeoff, he began to feel bad. He went to the bathroom, he had been inside for more than twenty minutes, he was already in front of the door.

At 8:50 am, the crew learned that one of the passengers was ill, so they asked those on board if there was a doctor among them and a nurse came in to help.

A few minutes later, the pilot announced that a forced landing would be made in Omsk because a passenger needed immediate medical attention. Navalny’s condition steadily deteriorated, he couldn’t speak, just roaring in pain in the staff cabin, lying on the ground.

At 9 a.m., the plane landed at the Omsk airport, and then at 9 a.m., ambulances arrived at the scene, who first examined the politician on board. They have come to the conclusion that there is nothing more they can do locally for his life, he must be transported to the intensive care unit immediately. In the meantime, they had infused it, but that didn’t help their situation much.

Finally the reinforcement arrived, the man was transferred to a hospital where he was treated for two days. Initially, due to his serious condition, he was not granted permission to be transported to Germany, but two days later, on August 22, the application was approved.

The Omsk doctors emphatically stated that no toxic substance had been identified in Navalny’s body and that the opposition leader was diagnosed with a metabolic disorder. Then it turned out that the Germans had poisoned him by novices.

Who, if not Putin?

Newbies, as we wrote at the beginning of the article, are a cruel and deadly neurotoxin that is an invention of the Soviets and has been used several times before. That is why the Russians are also likely behind the current case.

Leonid Volkov, Navalny’s campaign manager wrote on Twitter that in 2020, poisoning Navalny with rookies is like someone leaving their signature at a crime scene.

And suspicion is growing beyond borders. Angela Merkel The German Chancellor, for example,

what has happened raises very serious questions that only the Russian government can and must answer.

Although there is no evidence against Vladimir Putin and his government, it also suggests that it has not been safe to drink tea as an opposition in recent decades. Anna Politkovskaya a journalist lost consciousness on a plane in 2004 after having tea. He was poisoned but survived, and was eventually killed by gunmen. In 2006 Alexander Litvinenko a former KGB officer also died from a poisoned tea in a London hotel. And now it was Navalny’s turn.

What do they have in common? All three were great critics of Putin.

Why right now?

For the Russian president, Navalny is on the same level as Harry Potterben Voldemort. He doesn’t say his name, but he mistrusts him. Specifically, he has not named his rival in any of his official speeches since coming to power, despite the fact that he and his party are practically the only ones he may fear on some level.

At the same time, the question arises, why now? Why would Putin want to kill the leader of the opposition now, when he had been constantly threatened in previous years, and if he had had the opportunity to do so before?

Experts say one of the most likely theories is that the Kremlin wanted to prevent Navalny from mobilizing his camp as soon as possible, encouraged by a series of demonstrations in Belarus and demonstrations in Khabarovsk in the east of the country. Parliamentary elections will be held in Russia next year.

It is also unclear why Moscow decided to treat Navalny abroad, as they could be sure that sooner or later it would turn out that he had novices in his body. The only logical conclusion from this is that the Russians wanted everyone to know what they had done to get the message across – this is how everyone who tries to stand up does it. The Russian government, of course, denies all this.

Surely, if Navalny’s assassination was ordered from Russian government circles, Vladimir Putin knew about it, and even if he didn’t invent the liquidation scenario, he had to add his consent. And what would have stopped him from doing that? Two years ago, when he was also poisoned by novices Sergei scriptal, the perpetrators have in fact escaped the case with impunity, so they can rightly calculate that this is not the case here either.

The European Union will now have to decide whether to punish Moscow in the form of sanctions. However, this will not be easy, because in the absence of experience, no one knows what Putin’s response will be.

Featured Image: Sergey Guneev / Sputnik