By Serge Duchêne with AFP, AP
Published on
Five European countries, including the UK, France and Germany, accused Russia on Saturday of poisoning opposition politician Alexei Navalny in prison in 2024 using a rare toxin, on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference.
“We know that the Russian state used this deadly toxin to target Navalny, fearing his opposition,” the UK Foreign Office said in a joint statement with Sweden, France, the Netherlands and Germany on the eve of the second anniversary of the death of the fierce critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The UK also said it had referred Russia to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).
The foreign ministries of the UK, France, Germany, Sweden and the Netherlands said on Saturday that the analysis of samples taken from Navalny, who died two years ago, “conclusively confirmed the presence of epibatidine,” which is a toxin found in South American dendrobatid frogs.
These countries claimed that “only the Russian state had the means, the motive and the contempt for international law to carry out this attack.”
Navalny, who waged a fierce battle against corruption and organised large-scale anti-Kremlin protests as a fierce opponent of President Vladimir Putin, died in the Arctic prison colony in February 2024. He was serving a 19-year sentence that was believed to be politically motivated.
Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya, said last year that two independent laboratories had concluded that he had been poisoned shortly before his death. She has repeatedly accused Putin of being responsible for Navalny’s death, which the Russian authorities have categorically denied.
Navalny’s murder now a scientifically proven fact, says widow
“The assassination of Russian opponent Alexei Navalny in an Arctic prison in 2024 is now a scientifically proven fact,” his widow, Yulia Navalnaya, said on Saturday, after five European countries claimed that Moscow had used a lethal toxic agent against the Kremlin opponent.
“Two years ago, I came here and said that Vladimir Putin had killed my husband,” she said on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference.
“Of course, I was certain that it was murder… but at the time, they were just words. Today, those words have become scientifically proven facts,” she added.
The findings are based on independent laboratory analysis of biological samples that were secretly smuggled out of Russia. A public summary of the full technical report submitted to the OPCW is likely to be released on the OPCW official website.
