The Russian authorities tried to hide the fact that Alexei Navalny had severe abdominal pain, vomiting and convulsions just before his death, the independent Russian website The Insider reported. He said that these symptoms clearly indicate that the Kremlin critic was poisoned. The well-known oppositionist died in February this year in the Polar Wolf penal colony, where he was serving a long sentence.
The Insider website reported that its journalists had obtained official documents related to the death of Alexei Navalny in the Polar Wolf penal colony in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug. One of them describes exactly how a well-known oppositionist and critic of the Kremlin authorities felt just before his death.
Two versions of one document
The Insider published copies of the document refusing to initiate a criminal case, dated July 26, which was signed by investigator Alexander Varapayev. It concerns the circumstances of Navalny’s death and the crime report (most likely submitted by the oppositionist’s family or associates – ed.). It shows that during the walk, the Kremlin critic “felt a sudden deterioration of his health and reported it to the officer on duty, who took him from the walking area to the isolation room.”
The document included a statement that after returning to his cell, the oppositionist “lay down on the floor and began to complain of sharp abdominal pain, then he regurgitated the contents of his stomach, had convulsions and lost consciousness.”
On the same day, July 26, the second version of the same document was published, which became the final version and in which there were no words about abdominal pain and convulsions – The Insider reported and assessed that the symptoms described by Varapayev clearly indicate that the Kremlin critic was poisoned, and the removal of a specific fragment means that the authorities tried to hide it.
Portrait of Alexei Navalny in one of the churches in Berlin Sebastian Christoph Gollnow/DPA/PAP/EPA
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The Insider wrote that it also has copies of documents that indicate that fragments of clothes and objects were taken for examination, which may have contained “samples of Navalny’s vomit”. There was no official information about it, and no expert results were made public – reminds an independent portal.
They do not agree with the official version
According to doctor Alexander Polupanov, a member of the team that examined Alexei Navalny after his poisoning in August 2020, the symptoms indicated in the document published by The Insider do not agree with the official version of his death. It was allegedly an increase in blood pressure that was supposed to cause arrhythmia and overload the heart.
– This in no way explains the symptoms we see in this case: severe abdominal pain, vomiting and convulsions. It is unlikely that such symptoms can be explained by anything other than poisoning, Połupanow explained.
According to this doctor, the short time between the abdominal pain and the convulsions suggests that an organophosphate substance intended for internal use may have been used to poison Navalny. Polupanov treated Navalny in a hospital in Omsk after an attempted poisoning with novichok, which can be applied, for example, to the skin.
Correspondent of “Fakty” TVN Andrzej Zaucha: the Russian authorities are very afraid of the funeral of Alexei Navalny
Other facts speak for themselves
“There were also other facts that Navalny was poisoned. The authorities did not release Navalny’s body for a long time and did not allow it to be examined,” The Insider reminds.
On February 16, the day of Alexei Navalny’s death, the prison services of the Polar Wolf colony, where he was serving a long sentence, announced that Navalny “felt bad” and “lost consciousness” during a walk. Despite calling an ambulance and resuscitation attempts, the oppositionist died, the services reported. The well-known oppositionist’s associates already suspected that he might have been killed or poisoned on behalf of the Kremlin authorities.
Main photo source: Sebastian Christoph Gollnow/DPA/PAP/EPA
