THE HAGUE, October 7. /TASS/. Russia provided its response to the request of the so-called concerned states - Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) members on the Alexey Navalny situation, and initiated its own request for Germany, France, Sweden and the OPCW Technical Secretariat, Russian Permanent Representative to OPCW Alexander Shulgin told TASS Thursday.
"Today, effectively two days ahead of the deadline, Russia provided its worthy and legally calibrated response to the request of the 45 states," he noted.
"Simultaneously, we have initiated a request of our own," the diplomat said, adding that it was addressed to Germany, France, Sweden and the Technical Secretariat. "On the record and in attendance of all members of the OPCW executive committee, we once again handed over an entire list of questions to Germany, France and Sweden regarding this muddy story and their role in this spectacle they have staged themselves.
"We expect exhaustive, sufficient answers to out questions," Shulgin underscored. "The questions that we asked earlier still remain relevant today. But, new questions have risen over new details in the Navalny case situation."
Blatant lies
The OPCW Technical Secretariat blatantly lied to Russia regarding the technical assistance provided to Germany over the Alexey Navalny situation, Shulgin told TASS.
"The Technical Secretariat blatantly lied to us," he noted. "Back in the moment when OPCW experts worked in the Charite clinic, taking samples from Navalny, high-ranking representatives of the Organization kept assuring us that they have no idea what kind of assistance do the Germans expect from the Technical Secretariat, and that they had not received any documents from Germany at all."
These conversations took place on September 10-11, Shulgin noted, while the OPCW received the German request on September 4.
"That means that the Technical Secretaries hid all this," the envoy said. "On the German’s request, they also classified any at least somewhat significant clauses in the report on the provision of technical assistance. In October last year, they presented this report to the executive council, but it was only a short summary, negotiated with the Germans, while the still sanitized all significant parts with a black marker."
Earlier, US State Department announced that the US and 44 other countries sent questions to the Russian Federation about the Navalny situation via the OPCW.
Russian blogger Alexey Navalny was hospitalize in Omsk on August 20, 2020, after his health rapidly deteriorated aboard a plane en route from Tomsk to Moscow. Later, he was transferred to the Charite clinic in Berlin. On September 2, 2020, the German government claimed that the blogger was poisoned by a Novichok-family nerve agent. Russian authorities repeatedly underscored that no poisonous substances were detected in his body before his transfer to Berlin. Russia stated its readiness for a comprehensive cooperation in the investigation of the incident and sent several official requests on this case.