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Allegations of poisoning Alexei Navalny: Putin under pressure

 


Tthat German Chancellor Angela Merkel confirmed what many had suspected on September 2 – that Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, currently in a coma at a Berlin hospital, had been poisoned by a nerve agent developed in the Soviet Union and Russia.

Merkel said testing by a special military laboratory had shown “clear” evidence that Navalny, who has published numerous allegations of corruption by officials from President Vladimir Putin’s United Russia party, was the victim of a nerve agent known as “Novichok”. The German leader called Navalny a “victim” of a crime that was intended to “silence” him. “This raises very difficult questions, which only the Russian government can and should answer,” she said.

Few people knew what Novichok was like before 2018 when UK officials discovered the military-grade nerve agent in the poisoning of former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in the city of Salisbury, England. Local resident Dawn Sturgess was later exposed to the same nerve agent and died at the hospital. United Kingdom accused two operatives from the Russian military intelligence service (GRU) of the attack, accusations that Russia denied.

Navalny, 44, crashed on August 20 on a flight from the Siberian city of Tomsk to Moscow. His spokesman said she doubted he was poisoned by a cup of black tea he drank at an airport cafe that day. The hospital where he was initially being treated in Omsk said on August 21 that they found no trace of poisoning and diagnosed Navalny with a metabolic disease that could have been caused by low blood sugar.

After intense lobbying by his family and supporters, the Kremlin gave permission for Navalny to transfer to Berlin on August 22, where he has been in a coma ever since. In a letter to the administration of Russian President Julia Navalnaya on August 21 wrote that her husband “needs qualified medical help”.

Navalny’s condition “continues to improve” the Charité hospital that treats Navalny He said on September 3rd. But doctors warning that “the recovery is likely to be long. It is still too early to assess the long-term effects that may arise in connection with this severe poisoning. “But beyond the health of the activist, the effects on his country and the world can be similar:

Does Novichok’s revelation prove that Putin poisoned him?

Navalny supporters say the nerve agent carries the main signs of Kremlin involvement. “Novichok’s choice to poison Navalny in 2020 is essentially the same as leaving an autograph at the crime scene,” Leonid Volkov, Navalny’s chief of staff, wrote on Twitter, attaching an image of Putin’s signature. Ivan Zhdanov, an aide to Navalny, tweet“Only a government can do that.”

Ben Noble, a lecturer in Russian politics at University College London, says Novichok’s use suggests one of three scenarios: either Putin ordered Russia’s security service or military intelligence to take Navalny; or Putin gave his tacit approval to another actor’s initiative to poison Navalny; or the state was not involved and Putin no longer has control over how chemical weapons are used in his country.

Some experts say it is not inconceivable for a private citizen to take the nerve agent. “If you are in Putin’s inner circle, if you are rich and powerful, you can probably get entry to Novichok,” says Mark Galeotti, a Russian expert at the Royal United Services Institute. “This is not a deeply regulated place that people ever get,” he says.

Tatiana Stanovaya, founder and CEO of political analysis firm R.Politik, suspects Putin made the order even if the secret service could have been involved. “Putin does not see Navalny as a big threat, but there are many players around him who see him as an enemy and would be willing to defend the regime from him,” she says. The president may not yet know what happened, she adds.

How are international leaders expecting the Kremlin?

Merkel has promised an investigation by the EU and NATO. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson condemned the poisoning as “savage”. “The Russian government now has to explain what happened to Mr Navalny – we will work with international partners to ensure that justice is done,” he wrote on Twitter.

US National Security Council (NSC) He said the alleged poisoning was “completely reprehensible” and that it would “work with allies and the international community to hold them accountable in Russia, wherever evidence leads, and limit funding for their malicious activities”, in a series of tweets on September 2nd. But US President Donald Trump has remained calm on the issue. When asked on Aug. 20 about Navalny, Trump’s hospitalization He said “We have not seen him yet, we are looking at him, and Mike [Pompeo]will report to me soon. “

The EU has urged Russia to launch a “transparent” investigation into the poisoning, and Jens Stoltenberg, secretary general of the NATO defense alliance, has also called for an investigation. in a tweet. NATO members will discuss the poisoning at a special meeting today.

Galeotti warns that a Russian investigation will not be “transparent or have the necessary international involvement”, citing his limited investigation into the 2015 assassination of Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov as one such example.

Are there likely to be new sanctions against Russia or Putin?

It’s possible. Some analysts say they expect Western governments to expel Russian diplomats and impose sanctions. The EU said on September 3 that sanctions would be possible only when it was determined who was responsible for Navalny’s poisoning.

In the Skripal case, Britain persuaded 20 countries to deport a total of 200 Russian diplomats to the largest collective diplomatic sentence since World War II. “It was a triumph of British diplomacy and it really surprised Russia,” Galeotti says. “It set a significant shift in their intelligence activities and it was embarrassing for a country trying to present itself as a great power,” he added.

However, Stanovaya says he doubts there will be a strong diplomatic return because Navalny was attacked on Russian soil while Westminster took the Skripals poisoning in Salisbury as an attack on UK national security. In March 2018, then Prime Minister Theresa He said “This was not just a crime against Sergei and Julia Skripal. “It was an indiscriminate and reckless act against the United Kingdom.”

In Germany, some political figures favor tougher measures than diplomatic deportations. Norbert Roettgen, a top lawmaker in Merkel’s party and a possible successor to the chancellor, said “diplomatic rituals are no longer enough” in an interview with Deutschlandfunk radio on 2 September.

Pressure is now mounting across the German political spectrum for the Chancellor to take punitive action on Nord Stream 2, a 760-mile gas pipeline being built to transport natural gas directly from Russia to Germany. Some EU countries say this will increase Europe’s dependence on Russian gas, and Trump, who sees the pipeline as a security threat to Europe, introduced sanctions last year in several firms involved. “We have to respond in the only language Putin understands – that is selling gas,” Roettgen said.

But it is unclear whether Merkel will submit. Asked last week if Germany should withdraw from the project due to the attack on Navalny, she said the two issues were separate. “It is not appropriate to make a connection between the Navalny affair and a commercially run project,” she said.

How is Russia responding?

Russia has denied Merkel’s allegations against Navalny and accused Germany of failing to provide Moscow with any evidence of his whereabouts. “The Russian side has not received a single document on this issue,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on September 3. interview with Russia 24, a state-backed news channel. “There is nothing to answer,” she said.

Dmitry Peskov, Kremlin spokesman, He said on September 2 that “no toxic substances” were found in Navalny before he went to Germany and said there was no reason to accuse Russia of poisoning him. “I would speak carefully to accuse the Russian state. “After all, there are no charges and there is no reason to accuse the Russian state,” he said.

For Putin, experts say, these accusations are a geopolitical attack. “It’s not about Navalny, it’s about destroying Russia,” Stanovaya said. “Russia will demand that Germany take all the evidence. “But it will never be enough,” she said.

How will Navalny poisoning affect the opposition?

It’s a “big strike” against the opposition, says Stanovaya – and one that comes after Putin has already spent years threatening, arresting and imprisoning Kremlin critics, introducing laws throwing certain kinds of criticism at the government as threats to state security and forcing civil society organizations to shut down. In July, Navalny was forced to close His Anti-Corruption Foundation due to large court fines imposed during one of his investigations.

But the apparent effort on Navalny’s life can also mobilize anti-Putin sentiment and quick resentment and anger. “It is possible that people who are unsure of their political views will get angry and turn to the support of an anti-Putin figure,” she added. Sergei Shnurov, a public figure and member of the center-right Growth Party, said that before Navalny’s possible poisoning he was “indifferent” to him and now he is “for him”, in a poem posted on his social media. He also suggested he would send money to the opposition leader’s anti-corruption activists.

Putin will continue to distance himself from any involvement in Navalny poisoning, Noble says. “Given the recent mass protests in the Russian city of Khabarovsk over controversial allegations against the governor,” the prospect of another reason for Russians to protest in the streets will be deeply troubling to Putin, “Noble says.

Contact us at [email protected].



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