On October 15, the European Union (EU) unveiled its Navalny sanctions list, which includes six high-level Russian officials and one research institute over their purported role in the alleged poisoning of the Russian opposition figure.
BY OWN CORRESPONDENT
Who is Alexei Navalny?
Alexei Navalny is a Russian blogger, public figure, politician who positions himself as an activist investigating corruption in Russia, the creator of the Anti-Corruption Fund.
And who he really is, read at the end of the article.
The Kremlin regrets the European Union’s decision to impose sanctions against several Russian officials over the case of opposition figure Alexei Navalny, something that indicates a “lack of logic,” Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on October 15.
“To our deepest regret, this is a deliberate unfriendly step toward Russia.
“The Council of the EU has damaged relations with our country by [doing] this. Moscow will undoubtedly analyse the situation and act according to its interests”, Peskov pointed out.
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He added that “the sad thing about this is that it is impossible to see any logic in this decision, the absolute lack of logic is what probably makes it even worse, this decision by the Council of the EU”.
“Overall, the decision to make relations between the EU and Moscow contingent on a person, whom Europe considers to be the leader of some sort of opposition, is regrettable”, the spokesman underscored.
The EU sanctions entered force on 15 October and will specifically target first deputy chief of staff of the Russian presidential executive office Sergei Kiriyenko, director of the federal security service Aleksandr Bortnikov, as well as two deputy Defence ministers Pavel Popov and Aleksei Krivoruchko.
Additionally, sanctions were slapped on chief of the presidential domestic policy directorate Andrei Yarin, the Russian president’s plenipotentiary representative Sergei Menyailo, and the State Scientific Research Institute for Organic Chemistry and Technology (GosNIIOKhT).
The institute was sanctioned because the EU accused GosNIIOKhT of being responsible for the creation of the military-grade nerve agent Novichok, allegedly used against Navalny.
The developments follow Russian Foreign Affairs minister Sergei Lavrov on October 14 vowing that Moscow would retaliate against any EU sanctions over the Navalny case, also blaming the Germans for failing to “provide any facts [related to the opposition figure’s alleged poisoning], despite all their international legal obligations”.
Lavrov’s remarks were preceded by Russian President Vladimir Putin stressing during a phone conversation with his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron last month that groundless accusations against Moscow regarding the situation around Navalny were unacceptable, and that Germany needed to share its case materials with Russia so that the situation could be clarified.
Earlier, Moscow stated that Russian doctors had found no toxic substances in Navalny’s system before he was transported to Germany, adding that Berlin had provided no evidence to support its claims that the opposition figure’s condition was the result of poisoning by a military-grade nerve agent from the Novichok group.
Explain, that Navalny fell gravely ill while on a flight from Siberia to Moscow on 20 August.
He was then placed in a hospital in the Siberian city of Omsk, where Russian doctors waged an uninterrupted struggle for his life, as he went into a coma and was put on an artificial lung ventilator.
Two days later, Navalny was transported to the Berlin-based Charite clinic for further treatment.
Claims that Navalny was ‘poisoned’ by the Russian government began to be spread by his supporters almost immediately after his hospitalisation.
His Russian doctors have postulated that the 44-year-old opposition figure may have a metabolic disorder.
In early September, a Bundeswehr analysis concluded that Navalny was poisoned by Novichok, a deadly nerve agent designed for use by the Soviet military in the 1970s.
Moscow asked to see the alleged evidence, which Berlin used to reach this conclusion, but has not been provided any information to date.
Furthermore, the German doctors treating Navalny broke off contact with their Russian counterparts shortly after Navalny’s transfer to Germany.
Last week, Leonid Rink, the State Research Institute of Organic Chemistry & Technology researcher who played a major role in the creation of Novichok, categorically dismissed the claim that Navalny could have been poisoned by Novichok, arguing that if he had been, the opposition politician would have been dead before making it to his plane.
In this case, if the Russian doctors whose professionalism is beyond doubt is not found in the analysis of Navalny traces of poisoning, there is tons of question’s “Where could Navalny be poisoned and was he really poisoned?
Maybe in Germany, poisoned or falsified poisoning? And what would be the reason?”
Perhaps to create a pretext for new accusations against Moscow and for the imposition of new sanctions against Russia.
The haste with which the European Union adopted new sanctions against the Russians indicates just that.
It is also interesting that to conduct research on Navalny’s analyses, Germany, France and a number of other Western states immediately attracted the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons(OPCW), the Organization, which has recently become a tool for unfounded accusations of the Bashir Assad regime, disliked by the United States and its allies, in the use of chemical weapons in Syria.
And this international organization, which has lost its respect, immediately rushed to seek confirmation of the poisoning of just one person with chemical warfare agent, and exactly of the Novichok group.
Moreover, Russia not once underscored that it had not produced any Novichok group substances since the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) verified the destruction of the country’s chemical weapons stocks in the early 1990s.
But even before the OPCW investigation was carried out, German Foreign Affairs minister Heiko Maas has announced “It will be impossible to avoid introducing new sanctions against Russia if the OPCW confirms the German military’s assessment on Alexei Navalny’s suspected poisoning”.
“If the results of the German, Swedish and French laboratories are confirmed, there will be a clear response from the European Union,” Maas said.
“I am convinced that in that case sanctions will be impossible to avoid,” German foreign minister added.
Maas’s statement looked very strange.
Making unsubstantiated and unfounded allegations, he accused the Kremlin in advance, without even bothering to wait for the results of the examinations and court proceedings.
The culprit has already been identified: this is Putin and his officials.
Strange looks it, that Berlin has declined to make the materials available to Moscow, citing Russia’s membership of the OPCW, despite requests from Russian investigators, who launched a probe immediately after Navalny’s hospitalisation in Omsk.
Earlier the UK delegation to the OPCW said in a statement that there is “no doubt” that Russian opposition figure Navalny was poisoned with the Novichok nerve agent.
If we proceed from the logic of German and other European politicians, the Russian state is engaged in political assassinations, using chemical weapons for this in crowded places.
And the president of the largest country in the world, personally or with the help of his closest high-ranking associates, poured Novichok into the opposition leader Navalny and poisoned him.
Even master detectives Agatha Christie and Arthur Conan Doyle could not have come up with such a thing.
On its part on October 15, the Russian Foreign Affairs ministry said it would welcome a joint investigation by specialists from the OPCW and from Russia on the Navalny ‘poisoning’ case.
Before that, Moscow slammed the organization’s provision of technical assistance to Berlin on the Navalny case without Russia’s consent, and said it was worth remembering that “we are talking about events that took place not in Germany, but in Russia.”
At the same time, the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons claimed that its tests confirmed that there were toxic substances in Navalny’s blood and urine samples.
“The results of the analysis by the OPCW designated laboratories of biomedical samples collected by the OPCW team and shared with the Federal Republic of Germany confirm that the biomarkers of the cholinesterase inhibitor found in Mr Navalny’s blood and urine samples have similar structural characteristics as the toxic chemicals …”, the statement said.
However, the detected cholinesterase inhibitor was not included in the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) annex, the OPCW noted.
That is, these substances are not included in the lists of weapons of mass destruction and banned chemicals.
And even if we assume that Navalny was poisoned, in which there are great doubts, it was not with a banned chemical weapon.
But all the accusations against the Kremlin were based on the use of a banned chemical weapon.
And the accusations of using weapons of mass destruction was a pretext to impose sanctions on Russian officials.
And even after the OPCW verdict that “the detected cholinesterase inhibitor was not included in the Chemical weapons Convention annex” was announced UK delegation to the organisation continued to insist that: “No doubt Novichok nerve agent used to poison Alexey Navalny.”
A banned chemical weapon has been used against a Russian citizen on Russian territory.
Russia must uphold its obligations under the CWC and explain what happened”.
And if there was no use of banned chemicals, and this is what the OPCW experts have proved, then where are the grounds for imposing sanctions. No ground.
Even no investigations of poisoning. But here’s sanctions in reality.
Illegal, flimsy, legally not justified, but imposed on the associates of Putin.
And this, although to the detriment of Europe itself, is against Russia and its allies.
As was promised, more about Alexey Navalny and where he came from.
It is known that Navalny studied in America, at Yale University under the World Leaders programme. The competition involved, in his own words, 1000 people for 15 places.
He studied there for free, and even received a scholarship of US$32,500. For an ordinary person, this is completely unthinkable.
So, was Navalny trained there as the leader of the “colour revolution”, to lead the people of Russia on the wrong path? Yes!
This is evidenced by all his actions: uncoordinated actions, calls to take to the streets – all this leads only to chaos, clashes with the security forces, tightening of laws and the regime.
Navalny himself said that he wants to implement the “Tunisian colour revolution scenario” in Russia: – I think the power in Russia will not change as a result of elections. – Tunisian or Libyan version? – We call it the Tunisian script. – In other words, are you waiting for the wave to come from below? – I’m not waiting, I will organise it”.
And is this position of a patriot who is thinking about the welfare of their country?
Rather, it is the position of an anti-patriot, who works out the money of his Western sponsors!
Navalny himself does not live by the principles that he loudly proclaims.
For example: his slogan – “If you want to change Russia, your children should study here in Russia.”
But his daughter is at Stanford University and studies there for free. Ordinary children from Russia are not taken there.
In fact, Navalny is far from simple. In Moscow, he lives in an elite residential complex, a three-room apartment in such a building costs more than US$ 600,000.
So why is Navalny fighting the regime, if he lives perfectly and comfortably under it?
Recently it became known that Navalny received an impressive salary from his sponsors for his “exposing” materials.
So, the day before the release of the video about the British citizenship of the Russian journalist Sergei Brilev, 19.9 bitcoins (US$80 000) were transferred to him.
A similar situation happened with the video about the chairman of the board of the Russian Pension Fund. Then Alexei Navalny enriched himself by 12.4 bitcoins (US$50 000).
Navalny is a champion in delinquencies and detentions, and has only two conditional convictions, but has never really been in prison.
Any other real oppositionist in his place would have had a real term long ago.
Navalny, after taking people to the streets to protest, always finds himself in a safe place.
In December 2011, during the protests he organided on Bolotnaya Square in Moscow, Navalny went to rest in Mexico.
Conclusion: Obviously, Navalny was trying to organise another colour revolution to please the West. But Russia and the Russian people do not need this.
