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Alexei Navalny, Putin’s archrival and critic, posed for a photo in a park after being discharged from the hospital following failed poisoning by Novichok.
The 44-year-old revealed that he is still in rehab and is learning basic skills such as balancing, catching, throwing and writing after the attempt on his life, which has been attributed to the Russian state.
But he said recovery will continue outside the hospital after doctors ruled that he is healthy enough to leave and that a “full recovery” is possible.
It comes a month after the dissident politician slipped into a coma during a flight in Russia, spending a total of 18 days in a coma.
Navalny has vowed, through his spokesman, to return to Russia to continue his opposition to Putin’s government, although it is unclear exactly how long that will take.
Alexei Navalny has been discharged from hospital in Germany after recovering from failed poisoning by Novichok (pictured, Navalny in hospital yesterday with what appear to be scars on his neck, similar to those Yulia Skripal received after was also poisoned with Novichok)
The news comes just over a month after Navalny fell ill after boarding a flight at Tomsk airport in Russia (pictured left) and had to be pulled from the plane in a coma (right).
Along with the photo of himself in the park, Navalny gave an update on his recovery, saying he looked like Gollum from The Lord of the Rings when he first woke up and feared he would never be discharged.
Describing his recovery as a ‘miracle’, he said that he will continue to recover at home, but that he has a long way to go until he reaches full physical form.
“The plans are still simple,” he wrote. ‘A physical therapist every day. Possibly a rehab center. Stand on one leg. Regain control of my fingers completely. Keep your balance.
‘It’s funny, I dreamed of learning to ride a wakeboard behind a boat on the wave and I learned this summer. And now I’m learning to stand on one leg.
All sorts of fun things popped up. For example, I can’t throw the ball with my left hand. I can even catch, but not throw. The brain just doesn’t want to make this move.
Or write by hand. Until recently, it didn’t work online. All the time I started in a column. Rehabilitation, in general.
After thanking his followers, he added: ‘By the way, I’ll try to spend a little more time on social media.
“Yesterday a neuropsychologist came and tested me to see if I was stupid. I asked: what can I do to help me recover not only from physical symptoms, but also neurological ones?
‘I liked the answer: read more, write on social networks. Playing video games. I need to find out if the hospital can get a prescription for PS5. ‘
The news that Navalny has been released comes five days after he last shared an update on his condition, which showed he was able to stand and walk.
In the photo standing on a hospital staircase, the 44-year-old revealed that he had initially been unable to read or write after waking up from an 18-day coma into which he fell after being poisoned on a plane in Russia on 20 of August.
“Until very recently,” he wrote, “I didn’t recognize people and didn’t understand how to speak.”
Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny poses with his wife Yulia and their children at the German hospital where he is being treated after being poisoned with Novichok.
Navalny arrives at Tegel airport in Berlin after being airlifted from Russia. Doctors at the German hospital say his condition has improved
It is unclear where Navalny will stay until his eventual return to Russia.
The Kremlin continues to deny its involvement in the poisoning scheme and has requested evidence from Germany to support its conclusion of the Novichok poisoning.
Russia has also asked to send agents to interview Navalny, despite warnings from NATO that the state will “try again” to kill him.
The NATO chief insists that Russia was behind the poisoning, saying “there is no other explanation,” while France and Sweden have also concluded that Novichok, a Russian-made nerve agent, was used in the attack.
Navalny’s friends initially suggested that he was poisoned from a cup of tea that he drank at Tomsk airport shortly before boarding the flight where he fell ill.
But his political allies now believe the agent slipped into a bottle of water he drank from at a hotel.
After Navalny fell ill, the aircraft made an emergency landing in Omsk and was initially transferred to the hospital in the Siberian city.
The following weekend he was airlifted to Berlin, where doctors at the Charite hospital treated him with the antidote atropine and kept him in a medically induced coma.
On September 2, the German government announced that a military laboratory had found evidence of Novichok, the Soviet-era nerve agent used to attack Sergei Skripal in Salisbury in 2018.
Germany said there was “unequivocal evidence” for Novichok, which has since been independently confirmed by labs in Sweden and France.
Navalny’s allies have pointed the finger at Vladimir Putin, saying that only the Russian government could use a military-grade nerve agent like Novichok.
Western leaders have lobbied Russia to explain how Navalny was poisoned, but the Kremlin has denied its involvement and downplayed Germany’s findings.
Despite international calls for Russia to conduct a transparent investigation or risk sanctions, it has not opened a criminal investigation.
“There are very serious questions now that only the Russian government can answer, and must answer,” Angela Merkel said earlier this month, describing what happened to Navalny as “the attempted murder by poisoning of one of the leading figures of the the opposition of Russia “.
Doctors at Charite Hospital (pictured Monday) say Navalny’s condition is improving, two weeks after a German military laboratory discovered that he had been poisoned with a nerve agent.
While Berlin stopped short of directly indicting Russia, Navalny’s aide Ivan Zhdanov said that Novichok “can only be used by the state,” suggesting that the GRU or FSB intelligence agencies were responsible.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said today that everyone would welcome Navalny’s recovery, adding that he was free to return to Russia.
“Any citizen of the Russian Federation is free to leave Russia and return to Russia. If a citizen of the Russian Federation regains his health, then of course everyone will be happy about it, ‘he said.
Peskov said the Kremlin was willing to clarify what happened to Navalny, but needed access to information about his case from Germany.
Moscow did not understand why Russia was not being given the same access as French and Swedish laboratories, Peskov said.
A spokesman for the German Foreign Ministry previously responded to the Russian line saying that Russian doctors had access to Navalny immediately after he fell ill.
Samples taken from Navalny were also sent to the Organization for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) in The Hague for further testing.
The head of Russia’s foreign intelligence service said today that Navalny showed no signs of poisoning before being transferred to Berlin for treatment.
“It is a fact that at the time Alexei Navalny left Russian territory, there were no toxins in his system,” Sergei Naryshkin said.
“So we have a lot of questions for the German side,” he told reporters.
Doctors at the hospital said in their sixth official update on Monday that Navalny’s condition “continues to improve.”
Navalny’s allies pointed the finger at Russian President Vladimir Putin (pictured) after the opposition leader fell ill, but the Kremlin dismissed the accusations.
‘The patient has been successfully withdrawn from mechanical ventilation. He is currently mobilizing and may get out of bed for short periods of time, ” the statement said.
“The decision to release the details of Mr. Navalny’s condition was made in consultation with the patient and his wife.”
Despite his recovery, doctors have said they cannot rule out long-term health problems associated with the poisoning.
The EU diplomatic chief, Josep Borrell, today urged Russia to carry out a “complete and transparent procedure” to investigate what happened with Navalny.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov accused the West of using the incident as a pretext to introduce new sanctions against Moscow.
The apparent assassination attempt has fueled calls to remove the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, a Kremlin’s flagship project to bring more Russian gas directly to Germany under the Baltic Sea.
Navalny has been a thorn in the Kremlin’s side for more than a decade, exposing what he says is high-level corruption and mobilizing protests.
He has been repeatedly detained for organizing public gatherings, sued for corruption investigations and barred from running in the 2018 presidential election.
The 44-year-old has also served multiple terms in jail in recent years for organizing protests against the Kremlin.
The European Court of Human Rights has ruled that the arrests and detention of Navalny by Russia in 2012 and 2014 were politically motivated.
The office of French leader Emmanuel Macron said it had expressed “ deep concern over the criminal act ” in a call with Putin on Monday.
The Kremlin said Putin “underscored the incorrectness of the unfounded accusations against the Russian side” and reiterated Russia’s demand that Germany provide samples.
