The Russian side is preparing an additional request to Berlin for legal assistance in connection with the release of blogger Alexei Navalny from a coma. This was announced on Friday, September 11, by the acting head of the Investigative Department for Transport of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for the Siberian Federal District, Sergei Potapov.
“In connection with the publication in the media of reports on the withdrawal of citizen Navalny from a coma, the investigative units in accordance with the current European Convention“ On Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Cases ”of April 20, 1959 and additional protocols thereto, as well as in accordance with Art. 453 and 454 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation are preparing an additional request for legal assistance to the competent authorities of the Federal Republic of Germany, ”he said.
Russian law enforcement officers intend to ask not only for the opportunity to be present at the investigative actions that the German side will conduct, but also ask clarifying and additional questions.
On the eve of the Russian Federation’s Permanent Representative to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) Alexander Shulgin noted that Moscow would insist on a dialogue with Berlin on the situation with the blogger. In addition, the German side has not yet submitted to the OPCW any materials on the “Navalny case”, the presence of which was announced earlier. Russia, in turn, is ready to cooperate with both Germany and an international organization, Shulgin added.
Navalny felt unwell during the Tomsk-Moscow flight on August 20 The plane urgently landed in Omsk, the blogger was taken to the ambulance hospital № 1. He was transported to the Charite clinic in Berlin on August 22.
The German clinic said that they found signs of intoxication in the Russian with a substance from the group of cholinesterase inhibitors. However, Omsk doctors did not reveal intoxication with this substance during the examination of the patient. On September 2, the German government, citing data from a special laboratory of the Bundeswehr, announced that Navalny had been poisoned with a substance from the Novichok group.
However, no evidence of this was presented. Berlin does not respond to official requests from the Russian side, including the Prosecutor General’s Office and doctors, while demanding from Moscow some materials for the investigation.
On September 9, the Russian Foreign Ministry expressed a strong protest to the German Ambassador, Gez Andreas von Gaire, noting that the situation is being used to discredit the Russian Federation in the international arena, Gazeta.ru writes. If Germany does not provide a “substantive and detailed response” to the request of the Prosecutor General’s Office about the state of the Russian citizen, this will be regarded as Berlin’s refusal to establish the truth as part of an objective investigation, and further actions in the context of the situation will be considered a provocation.