Once again, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s top opponent is believed to have been poisoned. There’s a track record of Putin opponents suffering mysterious death or illness.
Alexei Navalny, Russia’s most prominent opposition politician, has been grappling with severe stomach pain in jail that could be the result of slow-acting poison, a close ally said on Friday.
Ruslan Shaveddinov said an ambulance was called last week to the maximum security IK-6 penal colony at Melekhovo, about 155 miles (250km) east of Moscow, where he is being held.
“His situation is critical, we are all very concerned,” Shaveddinov told the Guardian in a phone interview.
“We understand that the situation must have been very bad if an ambulance was called,” he said, adding that prison authorities refused to have Navalny admitted to hospital.
There had been no update on Navalny’s health condition since the ambulance arrived, Shaveddinov said, because “the prison authorities are doing everything possible to isolate him”.
Navalny communicates with the outside world through his lawyers.
The 46-year-old is serving sentences totalling 11-and-a-half years on charges including fraud and contempt of court, which human rights groups say were made up to silence him. . . .
THE GUARDIAN