Pompeo Says 'Senior Russian Officials' Likely to Be Behind Navalny's Alleged Poisoning

MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 10th September, 2020) US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that there is a "substantial chance" that Russian opposition figure Alexey Navalny had been poisoned by the order of "senior Russian officials."

"I think people all around the world see this kind of activity for what it is.� And when they see the effort to poison a dissident, and they recognize that there is a substantial chance that this actually came from senior Russian officials, I think this is not good for the Russian people.� I think it's not good for Russia," Pompeo told journalist Ben Shapiro in an interview published by the US Department of State on late Wednesday.

He added that the United States and the European Union were expecting Russia to bring those responsible for the incident to account

Navalny, 44, fell gravely ill while on a flight from Siberia to Moscow on August 20.

He was placed in a hospital in the Siberian city of Omsk, where the plane made an emergency landing. Two days later, Navalny was transported to the Berlin-based Charite clinic for further treatment.

On Monday, Charite announced that the politician's condition had improved and he was woken up from an induced coma.

Last week, the German government said traces of a nerve agent from the Novichok group were detected in Navalny's system. Moscow said Russian doctors found no toxic substances before he was transported to Germany and that Berlin has provided no evidence to support its claims.