Alexei Navalny Given Protection in German Hospital after Likely Poisoning

BERLIN, KOMPAS.com – Germany has placed Alexei Navalny under guard in hospital after determining that the Putin critic had most likely been poisoned.

The Navalny poisoning incident happened while he was campaigning in Siberia.

After drinking tea that his allies believed was laced with poison, Alexei Navalny then collapsed on a plane last Thursday.

He was flown to Germany for treatment on Saturday.

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"The suspicion is that Mr. Navalny was poisoned given that unfortunately, recent Russian history has had several such suspected cases," German Chancellor Angela Merkel's chief spokesman, Steffen Seibert, told journalists.

"Because one can say with near certainty that it was a poisoning attack, protection is necessary," Seibert added.

Russia's government made no immediate comment on the German statement.

The Kremlin said on Friday it was still unclear what caused Navalny to fall ill and that initial tests did not show he was poisoned.

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The incident could further strain Russia's fraught relations with its European and NATO neighbors, who have accused it of mounting attacks on dissidents in Europe in the past — accusations that Russia has dismissed.

Doctors at the Siberian hospital that first treated Navalny said earlier on Monday they had saved his life but that they had not found traces of poison in his system.

"If we had found some kind of poison that was somehow confirmed then it would have been a lot easier for us. It would have been a clear diagnosis, a clear condition and a well-known course of treatment," senior doctor Anatoly Kalinichenko told reporters in the Siberian city of Omsk.

The Russian doctors did not say what they had treated him for. Last week they said they had diagnosed him with metabolic disease possibly brought on by low blood sugar.

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