Moscow denies it poisoned Navalny with dart frog toxin
The Kremlin has flatly denied accusations from five European countries that the Russian state killed Alexei Navalny two years ago using poison dart frog toxin, but Navalny’s widow said the truth had finally been proven.
Navalny, President Vladimir Putin’s most prominent domestic critic, died on February 16, 2024, in the “Arctic Wolf” penal colony north of the Arctic Circle, about 1,900 km northeast of Moscow. He was 47 years old.
His death, which the Russian state said was caused by natural causes, occurred a month before Putin was re-elected for a fifth term in an overwhelming vote that western countries said was neither free nor fair due to censorship and a crackdown on dissidents.
Britain, France, Germany, Sweden and the Netherlands said on Saturday that analysis of samples taken from Navalny’s body “unequivocally” confirmed the presence of epibatidine, a toxin found in South American poison dart frogs and not found naturally in Russia.
“Navalny died while in prison, which means Russia had the means, the motive and the opportunity to apply this poison to him,” they said.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov denied the allegations.
“Naturally, we do not accept such accusations. We do not agree with them. We consider them biased and not based on anything. And we strongly reject them,” Peskov told reporters.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova had previously said that Moscow would comment on the issue if the countries making the claims release the test results and explain them in detail.
The allegations were “mere propaganda aimed at diverting attention from the West’s pressing problems,” the state TASS news agency reported by then.
The British government refused to answer a Reuters question on Saturday about how samples from Navalny’s body were taken or where they were evaluated.
The European joint statement cited the Novichok poisoning of former Russian agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter in Salisbury, England, in 2018, suggesting that Moscow is in good shape when it comes to using deadly poisons against its enemies.
Russia denies involvement in the Salisbury incident.
It also rejects British claims that Moscow killed dissident Alexander Litvinenko in London in 2006 by spiking his tea with radioactive polonium-210.
A group of 15 countries, mostly European countries, including Australia, New Zealand and Canada, issued a new statement on Monday, reiterating their demands for Russia to conduct a transparent investigation into Navalny’s death.
In the statement published on the website of the German foreign ministry, it was stated that Russian human rights defenders continue Navalny’s legacy and called on Moscow to release “all political prisoners”.
The dart frog toxin allegations were made at the Munich Security Conference ahead of the second anniversary of Navalny’s death on Monday.
His widow, Yulia Navalnaya, who has claimed from the beginning that her husband was killed by the Russian state, said Monday the findings provided the evidence needed to support her position.
“Two years. We have reached the truth and one day we will also reach justice,” Navalnaya wrote on social media, on a photo of her late husband smiling. wrote.
