A twist in the case of Navalny’s mysterious death – American intelligence officers have come to an important conclusion

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According to a Wall Street Journal report on Saturday American intelligence agencies have concluded that Russian President Vladimir Putin cannot be behind the murder of opposition politician Alexei Navalny. Navalny, who died at the age of 47 in a prison camp not far from the Arctic Circle, was Putin’s biggest domestic political rival.

Navalny’s supporters have previously accused Putin of killing the opposition leader and vowed to back up their claims with evidence.

The Kremlin, of course, denied the involvement of the Russian state in the case. Vladimir Putin himself called Navalny’s death sad and claimed that he would have been ready to hand him over to the West in a prisoner exchange if Navalny did not return to Russia.

The Wall Street Journal report also revealed that

Washington still holds Vladimir Putin responsible for the death of Alexei Navalny, as the opposition politician has been in the crosshairs of Russian authorities for years.

Navalny was first sentenced to a suspended prison sentence in 2013 on charges of embezzlement, and was poisoned in 2020 while on a flight between Tomsk and Moscow. He was treated in Berlin and, after returning to Russia in 2021, was imprisoned on charges of corruption. With the beginning of the Russian-Ukrainian war, the Russian prosecutors imposed more and more severe sentences on Navalny, sentencing him to a total of 30 years in prison.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called the Wall Street Journal article empty speculation.

The Wall Street Journal, on the other hand, claimed that the main finding of its material was widely accepted within the intelligence community. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and the State Department’s intelligence unit agreed.

The US finding was based on classified intelligence and an analysis of public facts, taking into account, among other things, the timing of Navalny’s death and its impact on Putin’s re-election. On the other hand, Leonid Volkov, one of Navalny’s top advisers, described the American assessment as naive and ridiculous.

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Cover image source: Sefa Karacan/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images