Moscow Urged Berlin Not to Politicize the Navalny Situation

Russia is waiting for the FRG's response to requests for legal assistance in the situation with Alexei Navalny, Sergei Lavrov told his German colleague Heiko Mas. Moscow wants to get access to treatment materials of the oppositionist in the Charité. Relations between Germany and Russia in the light of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny’s poisoning became the main topic of a telephone conversation between the Foreign Ministers of the Russian Federation and Germany, Sergei Lavrov and Heiko Mas, on Tuesday, September 15. The Russian minister called on his German counterpart to refrain from further politicizing the situation around the oppositionist. Moscow expects Berlin to react to requests for legal assistance in the situation with Navalny, Lavrov said. The Russian Foreign Ministry intends to regard the evasion of satisfying requests as "the partners' lack of desire to help establish the truth within the framework of an objective and comprehensive investigation." Moscow "cannot be satisfied with references to the" independence "of the judiciary and the need for coordination" with the politician himself or with his relatives and friends, those on Smolenskaya Square stressed. According to the Russian Foreign Ministry, such allegations hinder the admission of Russian criminologists and doctors to materials about Navalny's illness and his treatment at the Charité clinic in Berlin, located in Germany. Alexei Navalny’s poisoning The politician fell sick on the plane board flying from Tomsk to Moscow on 20 August. The liner urgently landed in Omsk, where Navalny was hospitalized. On August 22, at the request of his relatives, he was taken to Berlin for treatment. The oppositionist was in an artificial coma for 19 days. Experts from the Bundeswehr special laboratory of the German armed forces, at the request of the clinic, conducted a toxicological analysis of samples taken from Navalny and found traces of a nerve agent from the Novichok group. The FRG government stressed that the conclusions of the Bundeswehr experts are beyond doubt. On September 14, it became known that laboratories in France and Sweden, where the German side turned to verify their results, came to the same conclusion. Moscow rejects charges of being involved in the opposition leader’s assassination attempt. On September 15, Navalny made his first appearance on social media. The politician said he was on the mend and had been breathing for the whole day without assistance.