Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny was poisoned with the same type of Soviet-era nerve agent that British authorities identified in a 2018 attack on a former Russian spy, the German government said Wednesday, citing new test results.
The Berlin hospital treating Navalny said he remains in a serious condition though his condition is improving. It said that it expects a long recovery, and it still can't rule out long-term consequences from the poisoning.
The government said that testing by a special German military laboratory at the hospital's request showed "proof without doubt of a chemical nerve agent from the Novichok group."
"With this, it is certain that Alexei Navalny is the victim of a crime," Chancellor Angela Merkel said. "He was meant to be silenced and I condemn this in the strongest possible manner."
"There are very serious questions now that only the Russian government can answer, and must answer," Merkel said, who described what happened to Navalny as "the attempted murder by poisoning of one of Russia's leading opposition figures."
Navalny, a politician and corruption investigator who is one of Russian President Vladimir Putin's fiercest critics, fell ill on a flight back to Moscow from Siberia on August 20 and was taken to a hospital in the Siberian city of Omsk after the plane made an emergency landing.
He was transferred two days later to Berlin's Charité hospital, where doctors last week said initial tests indicated Navalny had been poisoned.
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