New lab results show Putin critic Navalny was poisoned in jail, wife says

The wife of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny said Wednesday that laboratory analysis of smuggled biological samples had found he was killed by poisoning while incarcerated in an Arctic prison in February 2024.

Navalny, President Vladimir Putin's most formidable critic for years, died in mysterious circumstances while serving a 19-year prison sentence on a string of charges widely seen as retribution for his campaigning.

Before he was buried, his wife Yulia Navalnaya said his allies "were able to obtain and securely transfer biological samples of Alexei abroad".

"Laboratories in two countries came to the conclusion that Alexei was killed. Specifically: poisoned," she said in a video posted on social media.

She did not divulge further details of what samples were obtained nor the results of the analysis, but she urged the labs to independently release their results and to specify which poison they believe was used.

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Navalnaya also published unverified photos she said were of his prison cell after his body was removed, showing a pool of vomit on the floor, and claimed that testimony from prison officials said he had been convulsing on the floor.

In response, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Wednesday he was unaware of the claims made by Yulia.

'Murder'

Navalny, a charismatic anti-corruption campaigner, had rallied hundreds of thousands across Russia in anti-Kremlin protests as he exposed the alleged ill-gotten gains of Putin's inner circle.

He was previously poisoned in 2020 while campaigning in Siberia and flown to Germany on an emergency evacuation flight, where he spent months recovering.

Jailed upon his return to Russia in January 2021, he was convicted on a series of charges, including "extremism".

From behind bars, he continued to campaign against Putin and spoke out against his invasion of Ukraine.

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Russian authorities said he died suddenly on February 16, 2024, after falling ill while outside walking after lunch in his prison colony.

Following Navalny's death, officials refused for days to release his body to his relatives, raising suspicions among his followers.

Navalnaya has maintained that her husband was killed on Putin's orders, an accusation she repeated Wednesday. 

"Vladimir Putin is guilty of the murder of my husband, Alexei Navalny," she said.

The Kremlin denies the charges.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP and Reuters)