Russia is demanding that European countries that accused Moscow of poisoning Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny with a dart frog toxin provide concrete data to support their allegation, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Wednesday.
Britain, France, Germany, Sweden, and the Netherlands said on Saturday that analyses of samples from Navalny’s body had confirmed the presence of epibatidine, a toxin found in poison dart frogs in South America and not found naturally in Russia.
“But given the toxicity of epibatidine and reported symptoms, poisoning was highly likely the cause of his death. Navalny died while held in prison, meaning Russia had the means, motive, and opportunity to administer this poison to him,” the European nations said in the joint statement.
Kremlin spokespeople claimed that the release was meant to overshadow the release of the Epstein Files.
“All the accusations against Russia were of the ‘highly likely’ variety. There were no specific details. It was purely a proclamation to become the opening act of the Munich (security) conference and to overshadow the Epstein files,” Zakharova told a news briefing on Wednesday.
“We demand they hand over concrete data on this issue.”
Russia slams accusations of poisoning Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny
“Naturally, we do not accept such accusations. We disagree with them,” Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday. “We consider them biased and unfounded. And, in fact, we strongly reject them.”
In contrast, Yulia Navalnaya, the late politician’s widow, said the truth about her husband’s death had finally been disclosed.
“Scientists from five European countries have established: my husband, Alexei Navalny, was poisoned with epibatidine – a neurotoxin, one of the deadliest poisons on earth,” she wrote.
“I was certain from the first day that my husband had been poisoned, but now there is proof: Putin killed Alexei with a chemical weapon.”
Who was Alexey Navalny?
Navalny was the forefront opposition politician to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
He had previously survived multiple attempts on his life. He was famously poisoned with the nerve agent Novichok in 2020 and was evacuated to recover in Germany.
He, his family, and his supporters maintained that the assassination attempt came directly from Putin, which the Kremlin has also fervently denied.
However, the Kremlin has had a history of murdering and severely injuring its opponents.
He returned to Russia in 2021, knowing that he faced a trial on false charges and certain arrests.
He was imprisoned in January of 2021 and later died in a prison in the Arctic Circle, where he was murdered on February 16, 2024.