Aleksei A. Navalny, the Russian opposition leader, suffered from heavy vomiting and convulsions shortly before he died in an Arctic prison last year, according to what the organization he founded called new information it had collected.
His wife and political successor, Yulia Navalnaya, claimed on Wednesday that the details supported her accusation that Mr. Navalny had been poisoned on Russian government orders, though she did not provide direct evidence.
In a 15-minute video posted on social media, she described what she said was a photo of Mr. Navalny’s prison cell showing vomit on the floor on the day he died, as well as excerpts from what she said were official incident reports submitted by five prison officials. She also said that her team had obtained biological samples from Mr. Navalny’s body and sent them for analysis in two countries.
Ms. Navalnaya did not explain how her organization had obtained the documents she cited in the video, and their authenticity could not be independently verified. She also did not say how biological samples had been obtained or where exactly they had been tested, though she claimed that the results pointed to poisoning.
“Aleksei was murdered,” she said, echoing the main assertion made by Mr. Navalny’s exiled organization, the Anti-Corruption Foundation, after his death. “More specifically, poisoned.”
The Kremlin spokesman on Wednesday declined to comment on her latest assertions.
Mr. Navalny, the Russian government’s most prominent political opponent, died in a maximum-security prison in the Russian Arctic on Feb. 16, 2024, from what officials claimed were natural causes. He had been serving a three-decade sentence on extremism-related charges.
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The post Navalny Vomited and Convulsed in Prison Before Dying, His Wife Says appeared first on New York Times.
